MVSICIA 

ANDMV5 
LOVERS  5? 


WFAFTHORP 


LIBRARY 

OF  THE 

University  of  California. 

Class 


MUSICIANS  AND  MUSIC-LOVERS 


MUSICIANS  AND  MUSIC-LOVERS 


AND  OTHER  ESSAYS 


BT 

WILLIAM  FOSTER  APTHORP 


NEW  YORK 
CHARLES  SCRIBNER'S  SONS 

1908 


COPYRIGHT.   1894,  BT 

CHARLES  SCRIBNERS  SONS 


Go 

HENRY  BARKER  TTTT,T, 


21166S 


PKEFACE 

Of  the  essays  included  in  this  volume,  four — 
Johann  Sebastian  Bach,  Additional  Accompani- 
ments to  Bach's  and  HandeVs  Scores,  Two  Mo- 
dern Classicists,  and  John  Sullivan  Dwight — have 
already  been  published.  The  one  on  Bach — origi- 
nally given  as  a  lecture  at  the  Lowell  Institute  in 
Boston,  in  the  course  of  the  winter  of  1886-87 — 
appeared  in  the  Contemporary  Review  for  Sep- 
tember, 1891 ;  the  one  on  Additional  Accompani- 
ments, in  the  Atlantic  Monthly  for  September, 
1878 ;  the  one  on  Two  Modern  Classicists  (Robert 
Franz  and  Otto  Dresel)  was  published  in  two  parts 
in  the  same  magazine  for  October  and  November, 
1893  ;  that  on  John  Sullivan  Dwight  appeared  on 
the  day  of  his  death,  September  5,  1893,  as  an 
obituary  notice  in  the  Boston  Evening  Tran- 
script. 

Musicians  and  Music-Lovers  is  taken  in  part 
from  an  article  of  the  same  title  that  appeared  in 
the  Atlantic  Monthly  for  February,  1879,  and 
in  part  from  a  lecture  on  Musical  Criticism,  given 


Vlll  PREFACE 

at  the  Lowell  Institute  in  the  same  course  as  the 
one  on  Bach.  Some  Thoughts  on  Musical  Criti- 
cism formed  part  of  the  same  lecture.  The  essay 
Music  and  Science  is  for  the  most  part  new,  al- 
though some  portions  of  it  are  taken  from  another 
lecture,  on  Evolution  in  Music,  given  at  the 
Lowell  Institute. 

The  essays  on  Giacomo  Meyerbeer  and  Jacques 
Offenbach  originally  appeared  in  the  Atlantic 
Monthly  for  October,  1879,  and  the  Interna- 
tional Eeview  for  March,  1881,  respectively. 
Both  have  been  rewritten,  and,  especially  the  one 
on  Meyerbeer,  considerably  extended  for  publica- 
tion here.  Although  I  still  fully  hold  all  the  opi- 
nions expressed  in  them,  it  will  be  well  for  the 
reader  to  bear  in  mind  the  dates  at  which  these 
two  essays,  and  the  one  on  Additional  Accompani- 
ments, were  first  written.  For  some  points  in  the 
last-named  essay  I  would  here  thankfully  express 
my  obligation  to  Mr.  Julius  Schaeffer's  two  admi- 
rable pamphlets,  Friedrich  Chrysander  in  seinen 
Clavier ausziig en  zur  deutschen  Handel- Ausgabe, 
and  Seb.  Bach's  Cantate:  "  Sie  werden  aus  Saba 
Alle  kommen"  in  den  Ausgaben  von  Robert  Franz 
und  dem  Leipziger  Bach  -  Verein. 

W.  F.  A. 

Bab  Harbor,  Me.,  June  28,  1894. 


TABLE  OF  CONTENTS 

PACT 

I.  Musicians  and  Music-Lovers,        ...      3 
II.  Johann  Sebastian  Bach,         ....    57 

III.  Additional  Accompaniments  to  Bach's  and 

Handel's  Scores, 99 

IV.  Giacomo  Meyerbeer, 139 

V.  Jacques  Offenbach, 179 

VI.  Two  Modern  Classicists,        ....  203 

VII.  John  Sullivan  Dwight, 277 

VLTI.  Some  Thoughts  on  Musical  Criticism,        .  289 
IX.  Music  and  Science, 301 


MUSICIANS  AND  MUSIC-LOVEBS 


MUSICIANS  AND  MUSIC-LOVERS 

Persons  whose  taste  for  music  has  brought  them 
into  contact  with  the  more  cultivated  class  of  mu- 
sicians must  have  noticed  how  difficult  it  is  to  talk 
sympathetically  with  them  about  their  art.  One 
can  seldom  broach  the  subject  of  music,  on  which 
most  of  us  are  inclined  to  express  ourselves  rather 
warmly,  without  having  a  certain  chilling  sense 
that  the  musician  who  happens  to  be  present  in  no 
wise  participates  in  that  genial  enthusiasm  which, 
one  somehow  instinctively  feels,  ought  to  season 
the  conversation.  The  musician,  at  such  times, 
is  apt  to  preserve  a  monosyllabic  aloofness,  which 
gives  us  no  very  favourable  idea  of  his  temper  ;  it 
seems  impossible  to  force  him  into  sympathy  with 
our  point  of  view,  which  is  generally  a  some- 
what feverish  one.  If  we  have  the  ill  luck  to  fall 
a-rhapsodizing  in  the  presence  of  a  musician  over 
a  composition  that  does  not  happen  to  be  his  own, 
we  are  usually  met  with  a  stare  which,  to  the  jea- 
lous, might  seem  not  unfavoured  with  disdain,  and, 
in  spite  of  its  struggles  to  be  polite,  says  plainly 


4  MUSICIANS  AND   MUSIC-LOVERS 

enough  :  "  And  pray  what  do  you  know  about  it  ?  n 
It  is  hard  to  have  a  wet  blanket  thus  cast  over  our 
fine  feelings  ;  but  did  it  ever  occur  to  us  how  dif- 
ficult it  is  to  talk,  I  will  not  say  well,  but  with 
common,  every-day  coherence  and  sanity,  about 
music  ?  The  musician  knows  this  from  sad  ex- 
perience ;  he  knows  that,  to  begin  with,  it  will 
often  take  him  some  time  to  find  out  whether  he 
is  meeting  the  music-loving  layman  on  common 
ground  or  not,  whether  he  and  his  interlocutor  are 
really  trying  to  talk  about  the  same  thing. 

There  is  no  other  art  the  various  manifesta- 
tions of  which  are  so  ill  classified  in  the  general 
mind.  There  are  certain  quasi-hierarchic  distinc- 
tions almost  universally  recognized  in  the  other 
fine  arts.  When  a  man  has  a  wooden  structure 
put  up  to  cover  his  ash-barrel,  he  does  not  think 
of  it  as  a  piece  of  architecture ;  a  fondness  for  Mor- 
ton farces  or  dime  novels  is  not  usually  spoken  of 
as  a  taste  for  literature ;  and,  because  a  person 
takes  huge  delight  in  the  illustrations  in  the  comic 
weeklies,  we  do  not  say  he  has  a  marked  taste  for 
art.  To  be  sure,  a  wooden  shed  is  a  piece  of 
architecture,  dime  novels  are  literature  of  a  sort, 
and  the  cuts  in  Puck,  Life,  and  the  Journal 
Amusant  are  art ;  but,  in  our  habitual  use  of 
these  ponderous  terms,  we  apply  them  only  to 
works  of  a  certain  dignity.    With  music,  however, 


MUSICIANS  AND   MUSIC-LOVERS  5 

it  is  otherwise.  Many  people  seem  to  think  that 
music  is  music,  and  there  is  an  end  of  it !  A  mu- 
sician may  be  inveigled  into  talking  about  music 
with  a  man  who  astonishes  him  more  and  more 
every  minute  by  the  opinions  he  expresses — all  of 
them  of  a  general  and  sweeping  description — 
until  it  dawns  upon  him,  after  a  while,  that,  in- 
stead of  thinking  of  Beethoven  symphonies,  Han- 
del oratorios,  or  Chopin  nocturnes,  his  friend's 
real  point  of  departure  is  Silver  threads  among  the 
gold.  Not  long  ago  I  was  invited  to  meet  a  man 
who  had  been  described  to  me  as  devoted  heart  and 
soul  to  music  ;  I  am  not  sure  my  hostess  in  posse 
did  not  promise  me  I  should  find  that  he  and  I 
had  much  in  common.  The  formalities  of  intro- 
duction once  gone  through  with,  my  interesting 
new  acquaintance  and  I  soon  fell  to  discussing  the 
relative  excellence  of  orchestral  performance  here 
and  in  Germany.  Surprised  at  the  disparaging 
view  he  took  of  the  condition  of  instrumental  mu- 
sic in  this  country,  I  was  just  about  to  point  to 
what  I  considered  a  rather  shining  example,  Mr. 
Thomas's  orchestra  in  New  York,  when  he  fore- 
stalled my  arguments  by  telling  me  of  the  rare  de- 
light he  had  experienced  in  listening  to  a  little 
band  of  five  playing  popular  melodies  during  the 
table  d'h6te  dinner  at  a  hotel  in  Cologne.  I  was 
forced  to  admit  that  peptic  music  of  that  sort  was 


6  MUSICIANS   AND   MUSIC-LOVERS 

perhaps  better  cared  for  in   Germany  than  else- 
where ! 

One  is  constantly  exposed  to  misunderstandings 
in  thus  talking  about  music,  and  the  instance  I  have 
related  is  no  very  exceptional  one.  Another  cause 
of  the  difficulty  attending  general  musical  conver- 
sation is  the  widespread  ignorance  of  the  exact 
meaning  of  common  musical  terms.  We  Anglo- 
Saxons  are,  as  a  rule,  more  ignorant  of  musical 
terminology  than  the  Germans  or  French.  I  have 
come  across  professed  musical  critics  in  this  coun- 
try who  did  not  know,  and  showed  plainly  in  their 
writings  that  they  did  not  know,  the  real  meaning 
of  such  terms  as  score,  instrumentation,  intona- 
tion,— terms  of  every-day  occurrence  in  criticism. 
Not  very  many  of  the  regular  attendants  at  con- 
certs know  the  different  orchestral  instruments  by 
sight  and  name.  And  when  it  comes  to  terms 
that  apply  to  the  various  forms  of  composition, 
such  as  fugue,  canon,  sonata,  rondo,  etc.,  their 
meaning  is  exceedingly  little  known  outside  the 
musical  profession.  This  ignorance  of  musical 
terminology  implies  far  more  than  a  mere  lack  of 
acquaintance  with  what  are  sometimes  called  "  ab- 
struse technicalities ;  *  it  implies  a  deplorable 
absence  of  the  habit  of  definite  thought  on  musical 
subjects.  People  who  have  definite  ideas  to  express 
do  not  long  want  for  definite  words  wherewith  to 


MUSICIANS  AND  MUSIC-LOVERS  7 

express  them ;  and  it  is  mainly  because  so  many 
persons  have  no  distinct  and  clean-cut  ideas  on 
music  that  they  do  not  feel  the  inconvenience  of 
not  understanding  musical  terms. 

This  brings  me  to  the  heart  of  the  matter,  to  the 
chief  and  fundamental  obstacle  to  intelligent  con- 
versation on  music  between  musicians  and  music- 
loving  laymen.  The  great  trouble  is  that  many, 
perhaps  most,  people  deceive  themselves.  When 
they  think  they  are  talking  about  music,  they  are 
not  talking  about  the  music  itself  at  all,  but  about 
how  it  makes  them  feel ;  and,  as  the  world  goes, 
there  is  probably  no  single  subject  the  general  dis- 
cussion of  which  reveals  so  enormous  a  disparity 
between  the  intensity  and  the  definiteness  of  the 
impressions  people  receive.  So  the  musician,  who 
perceives  this  quite  plainly,  finding  that  any  dis- 
cussion of  the  subject  must  needs  involve  personali- 
ties such  as  may  not  be  entirely  palatable  to  his 
interlocutor,  can  only  take  refuge  in  silence  or 
evasive  answers. 

Few  people  really  talk  about  a  symphony,  a 
song,  or  an  opera  ;  what  they  do  talk  about  is  the 
impression  the  work  has  made  upon  them  :  and  this 
impression,  although  often  violent  and  deep,  is 
generally  excessively  vague.  Most  people  speak  of 
music  merely  subjectively,  speak  of  how  they  like 
it  or  do  not  like  it ;  only  the  few  either  speak  or 


8  MUSICIANS  AND   MUSIC-LOVERS 

think  of  it  objectively,  of  what  it  really  is  or  is 
not.  The  difference  between  the  musician's  and 
the  ordinary  music-lover's  enjoyment  of  music  is 
more  in  kind  than  in  degree  ;  it  is  a  fundamental 
difference  in  point  of  view.  Of  course,  I  am  ready 
to  admit  all  the  exceptions  you  please  ;  I  am  speak- 
ing in  generalities,  and  am  fully  aware  of  the  truth 
of  the  excellent  French  saw :  "  No  generaliza- 
tion is  quite  true ;  not  even  this  one  ! n  Indeed, 
the  great  difficulty  of  musicians  and  amateurs 
meeting  on  common  ground,  and  interchanging 
ideas  on  musical  subjects,  is  no  imaginary  one ; 
and,  although  the  trouble  of  you  and  your  friend 
not  knowing  whether  you  are  trying  to  talk  about 
the  same  thing  may  be  got  over  by  circumspection, 
the  other  part  of  the  difficulty  is  far  more  perplex- 
ing. A  little  preliminary  probing  will  often  throw 
all  sufficient  light  upon  the  first  trouble  ;  but  all 
rational  interchange  of  ideas  on  the  subject  in 
hand  will  at  times  seem  utterly  impossible.  And, 
if  it  is  hard  for  the  musician  to  discuss  music  with 
the  layman,  because  of  the  vagueness  and  lack  of 
definition  of  the  latter's  thought,  how  doubly  futile 
must  be  a  musical  debate  between  two  people 
neither  of  whom  has  anything  definite  to  say. 

I  can  not  think  the  elusory  nature  of  most 
people's  thoughts  on  music,  and  their  consequent 
inability  to  express  them,  arise  from  any  inherent 


MUSICIANS  AND   MUSIC-LOVERS  9 

difficulty  in  the  subject-matter  itself.  It  has  been 
said  that  music  is  especially  difficult  to  describe, 
that  no  description  of  a  piece  of  music  can  con- 
vey any  adequate  notion  of  the  impression  the 
music  itself  produces  upon  the  actual  listener. 
This  is  true  enough  ;  but  it  is  equally  true  of  paint- 
ing, sculpture,  architecture,  and  poetry.  You  can 
not  so  describe  a  picture  or  statue  as  to  convey  to 
another  the  impression  it  will  make  upon  him 
when  he  sees  it ;  a  symphony  can  just  as  well 
be  described  in  words  as  a  statue  or  picture,  and 
no  better.  It  is  six  of  one  and  half  a  dozen  of  the 
other. 

It  is  not  the  difficulty  or  impossibility  of  turn- 
ing musical  impressions  into  language  that  makes 
ordinary  musical  thought  so  vague  and  aimless  and 
musical  conversation  so  futile;  it  is  the  lack  of 
what  I  will  call  critical  habit  in  the  average  music- 
lover.  He  is  too  fond  of  merely  hearing  music, 
and  has  not  sufficiently  formed  the  habit  of  really 
listening  to  it.  His  musical  ear  has  not  developed 
the  finer  tactile  sense  ;  he  does  not  lay  hold  of  the 
music  with  it,  as  a  blind  man  takes  an  object  in  his 
hand,  to  see  what  it  is  like,  but  lets  the  music 
stroke  and  caress  his  ear,  as  people  have  their  back 
rubbed  or  their  hair  combed,  because  it  feels  good. 
And,  as  you  can  not  tell,  blindfold,  just  what  your 
back  is  being  rubbed  with,  but  only  whether  it  is 


10  MUSICIANS  AND  MUSIC-LOVERS 

hard  or  soft,  rough  or  smooth,  slippery  or  sticky, 
so  does  the  ordinary  music-lover's  ear  tell  him  little 
about  what  he  is  hearing,  beyond  its  being  soft  or 
loud,  impetuous  or  languid,  melodious  or  the  op- 
posite. I  repeat  that  I  am  willing  to  admit  all 
possible  exceptions  ;  naturally,  the  line  of  demar- 
cation between  musicians  and  unprofessional 
music-lovers  can  not  be  drawn  very  sharply,  for 
some  people  who  have  never  had  professional  rela- 
tions with  the  art  doubtless  listen  to  music  in  much 
the  same  way  musicians  do,  and  not  a  few  who 
make  their  bread  and  butter  out  of  music  are  habi- 
tually very  passive  listeners.  I  merely  wish  to  point 
out  a  characteristic  difference  between  the  general 
run  of  musicians  and  the  majority  of  amateurs ;  in 
some  cases  this  difference  may  be  but  slight,  al- 
though, as  a  rule,  it  is  quite  strongly  marked. 

That  the  prime  object  of  musical  culture  is  to 
enable  people  to  converse  intelligently  about  music, 
might  possibly  be  claimed  by  Lady  Ambrose,  in 
Mr.  Mallock's  New  Republic,  but  hardly  by  any 
one  else.  It  were  nearer  the  mark  to  say  that  one 
of  the  aims  of  conversation  on  musical  topics  was 
to  further  the  ends  of  musical  culture.  And,  if  I 
have  begun  by  noting  the  exceeding  rarity  of 
rational  talk  about  music,  and  the  difficulty  most 
people  find  in  expressing  definite  ideas  on  the  sub- 
ject, it  is  because  this  seems  to  me  one  of  the 


MUSICIANS   AND   MUSIC-LOVEKS  11 

most  patent  indications  of  where  the  screw  is  loose 
in  these  people's  relation  to  the  art.  The  chief 
trouble  is  that  they  have  not  formed  the  habit  of 
musical  observation.  From  looking  at  music  sim- 
ply as  a  source  of  vague  sensual  or  emotional  plea- 
sure or  a  promoter  of  certain  moody  conditions  in 
the  hearer,  and  not  thinking  of  listening  to  it  ob- 
jectively, to  find  out  just  what  manner  of  thing  it 
really  is,  people  often  fail  to  appreciate  the  rela- 
tive importance  of  certain  points,  not  only  in  this 
or  that  composition,  in  this  or  that  performance, 
but  in  the  very  art  itself. 

A  hundred  things  people  say  about  music,  a 
hundred  questions  they  ask,  show  plainly  enough 
how  utterly  they  mistake  the  relative  importance  of 
various  elements  in  the  art.  A  man  comes  to  me 
and  asks  me,  as  an  expert :  "  What  is  considered  by 
musicians  to  be  the  most  perfect  instrument  ? " 
He  might  as  well  have  asked  what  is  considered  by 
upholsterers  to  be  the  most  perfect  piece  of  furni- 
ture. These  are  questions  that  have  no  answer. 
Or  I  may  be  met  with  an  assertion  like  this : 
"  The  human  voice  is  the  most  perfect  of  musical 
instruments ;  therefore,  the  accompaniment  of  a 
song  should  always  be  subordinated  to  the  voice 
part."  Now,  even  were  I  inclined  to  admit  that 
the  human  voice  was  the  most  perfect  of  instru- 
ments,— which  I  can  by  no  means  do,  for  one  in- 


12  MUSICIANS  AND  MUSIC-LOVERS 

strument  is  as  perfect  as  another,  in  its  way, — I 
should  absolutely  deny  the  sequitur.  That  part  in 
a  composition  should  be  made  the  most  prominent 
to  which  the  composer  intended  the  greatest  promi- 
nence to  be  given,  and  the  perfection  or  faultiness 
of  the  instrument  that  plays  or  sings  it  has  no- 
thing to  do  with  the  matter.  Such  foolish  questions 
and  statements  come  from  the  utterly  muddle- 
headed  way  many  persons  think  about  music  ;  their 
whole  musical  experience  is  but  a  jumble  of  vague 
physical  or  emotional  impressions.  The  man  who 
asks  which  is  the  most  perfect  instrument  has 
probably  —  for  subjective  reasons,  which  neither 
he  nor  any  one  can  explain  —  become  especially 
fond  of  the  tone  of  some  particular  instrument,  say 
the  clarinet,  and  has  a  curiosity  (of  which  personal 
vanity  may  be  a  factor)  to  know  whether  musi- 
cians, as  a  class,  are  as  fond  of  it  as  he.  This 
other  person,  who  wishes  the  accompaniment 
always  subordinated  to  the  voice,  takes  such  de- 
light in  listening  to  a  fine  voice,  and  so  little 
pleasure  in  hearing  pianoforte  playing,  that  he 
naturally  objects  to  the  instrument's  interfering 
with  the  voice  part;  to  his  mind,  it  is  simply 
a  question  of  the  relative  agreeableness  of  two 
different  qualities  of  sound  ;  what  the  voice  sings, 
and  what  is  played  on  the  pianoforte,  are  to  him 
matters  of  comparative  indifference. 


MUSICIANS  AND   MUSIC-LOVERS  13 

Not  the  least  unfortunate  result  of  the  popular 
attitude  toward  music  is  that  people  in  gener- 
al, having  nothing  definite  to  say, — about  the  fifth 
symphony,  for  instance, — try  to  eke  out  their  in- 
distinct thought  by  falling  into  the  rhapsodizing 
vein.  Now,  of  all  talk  about  music,  the  rhapsodi- 
cal is  unquestionably  the  flimsiest.  Sweet  poetry 
and  soul-stirring  eloquence  can  illumine  most  things 
in  this  world  with  a  new  and  heavenly  light ;  but 
when  they  try  to  chant  the  praises  of  a  Beethoven 
symphony  you  have  only  to  play  a  few  measures 
of  the  divine  music  to  make  both  poetry  and  elo- 
quence seem  very  dark  indeed.  The  brightest  gas- 
flame  shows  black  against  the  sun's  disk  ;  and  who 
shall  worthily  rhapsodize  about  music,  which  is 
itself  the  most  incomparable  of  rhapsodies  ? 

It  is  peculiarly  noticeable  that  musicians  among 
themselves  say  little,  as  a  rule,  about  the  feelings 
music  calls  up  in  them  ;  they  talk  about  the  music 
itself,  and  such  talk  is  seldom  of  a  nature  to  inter- 
est an  outsider.  I  remember  once  listening  to  an 
impassioned  performance  of  Schumann's  overture 
to  Manfred  in  company  with  a  musician ;  all  he 
said  after  the  performance  was  :  "  How  much  more 
effect  Schumann  has  drawn  from  his  horns  here, 
by  using  the  open  notes,  than  he  often  does  by 
writing  chromatic  passages  for  them  !  "  This  was 
a  technical  point ;  as  for  rhapsodizing  about  the 


N- 


14  MUSICIANS   AND   MUSIC-LOVEKS 

music,  my  friend  wisely  let  that  alone.  It  is  both 
curious  and  instructive  to  note  how  Hector  Berlioz, 
a  man  who  felt  music  with  almost  frightful  inten- 
sity, and  whose  excitement  while  listening  to  some 
compositions  approached  the  pitch  of  frenzy, — to 
note  how  Berlioz,  in  his  series  of  essays  on  Beet- 
hoven's symphonies,  seldom  rises  above  the  consi- 
deration of  technical  details. 

I  have  said  that  the  difference  between  the  way  a 
musician  listens  to  music  and  that  in  which  a  less 
cultured  music-lover  hears  it  was  more  in  kind 
than  in  degree.  This  is,  however,  strictly  true 
only  of  the  way  both  listen  to  or  hear  the  higher 
and  more  complex  forms  of  music;  for  there  is 
music  of  some  sort  to  which  even  the  least  culti- 
vated music-lover,if  he  be  truly  musical  by  nature, 
listens  in  much  the  same  way  the  musician  does. 
All  really  musical  people  possess  what  I  have  called 
the  power  of  musical  observation  to  a  certain  de- 
gree, and  their  first  instinct  is  to  exert  this  power 
whenever  they  hear  music.  A  piece  of  music,  like 
any  other  work  of  art,  is,  or  should  be,  in  a  certain 
ideal  sense,  a  living  organism  ;  that  is,  each  one  of 
its  component  parts  has  an  organic  relation  to  the 
others,  and  all  of  them  to  the  whole.  To  per- 
ceive this  organic  relation  between  the  component 
parts  of  a  composition  is  tantamount  to  what  is 
commonly  called  understanding  it ;  and  such  un- 


MUSICIANS   AND   MUSIC-LOVERS  15 

derstanding  is  arrived  at  by  an  exertion  of  the 
power  of  musical  observation.  Now,  a  musical  per- 
son as  instinctively  tries  to  understand  whatever 
music  he  hears  as  we  all  try  to  understand  what 
any  one  says  when  we  hear  him  speak.  It  is  the 
specifically  unmusical  person  who  hears  music  with- 
out making  any  effort  to  apprehend  its  organic  form 
and  understand  it.  But,  though  we  can  not  help 
trying  to  catch  the  meaning  of  the  snatches  of  talk 
we  overhear  in  the  street  or  in  a  horse-car,  we  are 
fain  to  give  up  the  attempt  so  soon  as  we  discover 
that  the  conversation  is  carried  on  in  a  language  of 
which  we  are  ignorant.  Some  charm  in  the  speak- 
er's voice,  manner,  or  accent  may  still  hold  our  at- 
tention fast,  and  we  may  even  derive  a  certain 
pleasure  from  listening  to  the,  to  us,  incomprehen- 
sible and  almost  inarticulate  sounds  ;  but  all  en- 
deavour to  understand  ceases.  In  much  the  same 
way  essentially  musical  people  stop  trying  to  un- 
derstand music  so  soon  as  they  find  the  organic 
principle  of  its  structure  too  complex  and  abstruse 
for  them  to  grasp  easily ;  their  power  of  musical 
observation  is  inadequate  to  the  task,  and  they  soon 
cease  to  exert  it  at  all.  They  thus  fall,  quite  un- 
consciously perhaps,  into  the  mental  attitude  of  the 
unmusical  listener,  who  very  possibly  enjoys  music 
intensely,  but  merely  as  a  vaguely  defined,  emo- 
tional, and  mood-promoting  mass  of  sound. 


16  MUSICIANS   AND  MUSIC-LOVERS 

It  might  seem,  at  first  sight,  a  matter  for  wonder 
that  vast  numbers  of  people  who  are  possessed 
of  a  real,  if  undeveloped,  power  of  musical  observa- 
tion do  not  stick  to  the  music  they  can  understand, 
but  often  take  quite  as  great  or  even  greater  delight 
in  hearing  that  which  is  absolutely  beyond  their 
comprehension.  That  this  is  true  is  indubitable  ; 
and  all  astonishment  thereat  ceases  so  soon  as  we 
consider  how  immediately  the  emotional  side  of 
man's  nature  may  be  acted  upon,  while  his  intel- 
lectual faculties  are  nearly  dormant.  Many  people 
vastly  enjoy  music  the  organic  quality  of  which 
utterly  escapes  their  apprehension,  but  of  the  emo- 
tional force  and  spiritual  elevation  of  which  they 
do  catch  a  glimpse  by  a  certain  mysterious,  intui- 
tive second-sight.  You  do  not  always  have  to 
understand  greatness  to  know  when  you  are  in 
its  presence;  you  may  feel  it,  without  quite  know- 
ing how  or  why.  I  am  here  reminded  of  an  an- 
ecdote the  late  John  McCullough  once  told  me 
about  Miss  Mary  Anderson. 

McCullough  was  on  a  professional  tour  through 
that  part  of  the  country  in  which  Miss  Anderson, 
then  a  girl  of  fourteen  or  fifteen,  lived.  One  day 
some  friends  of  hers  called  to  ask  him  to  come  and 
hear  a  young  girl  recite  a  few  things,  and  give  his 
expert  opinion  of  her  talent ;  she  was  young,  and 
had  a  strong  ambition  to  go  upon  the  stage.     As 


MUSICIANS  AND  MUSIC-LOVEES  17 

prominent  actors  are  much  exposed  to  inflictions 
of  this  sort,  and  snch  interviews  end,  in  ninety-nine 
cases  out  of  a  hundred,  in  sheer  boredom  on  one 
side,  and  sore  heart-burnings  on  the  other,  McCul- 
lough  exhausted  all  the  excuses  his  ingenuity  could 
invent,  but  was  at  last  prevailed  upon  to  go  and 
hear  the  young  prodigy.  The  first  thing  Miss  An- 
derson— for  it  was  she — recited  to  him  was  Glos- 
ter's : 

M  Now  is  the  winter  of  our  discontent 
Made  glorious  summer  by  this  sun  of  York." 

McCullough  said  her  declamation  was  very  bad 
indeed,  and  it  was  evident  at  a  glance  that  she  did 
not  understand  more  than  half  she  spoke ;  but 
there  was  an  undefinable  something  in  her  per- 
formance that  seemed  to  him  to  give  promise  of 
genuine  dramatic  ability.  He  asked  her  if  she 
understood  what  all  that  meant  ?  "  No,"  answered 
she,  " I  don't  know  what  half  of  it  means,  but  it's 
all  sort  of  splendid,  somehow,  and  makes  you  feel 
grand  when  you  recite  it !  "  You  see  she  did  not 
understand  Shakspere,  and  would,  likely  enough, 
have  understood  Dr.  Watts, — had  that  perspicuous 
moralist  formed  part  of  her  reading, — but  she 
liked  her  Shakspere  for  all  that !  And  this  is 
the  way  hosts  and  hosts  of  people  enjoy  the  great 
masterpieces  of  music  :  they  "  don't  know  what  it 


18  MUSICIANS  AND  MUSIC-LOVERS 

means,  but  it  '$  all  sort  of  splendid  ! " — and  a  great 
deal  more  splendid  than  nmch  of  the  music  they 
can  understand. 

In  hearing  and  attempting  to  judge  of  the 
higher  forms  of  music,  the  amateur  has,  for  the 
most  part,  only  his  feelings  to  guide  him.  To  be 
sure,  the  most  cultivated  musician,  even  while 
listening  to  a  composition  for  the  first  time,  trusts 
largely  to  his  feelings  and  instincts,  and  may  thus 
seem  to  be  much  in  the  same  case.  But,  from  his 
superior  culture,  his  feelings  are  far  more  trust- 
worthy guides  ;  beauties  and  imperfections  strike 
his  ear  at  once,  and  are  felt  by  him  instinctively, 
which  it  would  take  much  study  for  the  amateur 
to  perceive.  And  by  superior  culture  I  do  not 
mean  merely  a  more  extended  special  knowledge, 
but  the  well-digested  and  assimilated  knowledge 
and  experience  which  go  to  make  fine  artistic  fibre 
in  an  organization  of  naturally  aesthetic  proclivities 
and  specially  musical  bent.  Eeal  genius  and 
original  power  can  be  more  or  less  clearly  recog- 
nized by  every  one.  Yet  I  think  the  true  position 
of  genius,  amongst  the  other  qualities  that  go  to 
make  up  what  we  call  an  artist,  has  often  been — I 
will  not  say  overrated,  but — misunderstood.  Some 
of  us  may  have  observed  a  seeming  tendency  in 
artists  to  speak  slightingly  of  that  heaven-sent 
power  by  virtue  of  which  he  who  possesses  it  can 


MUSICIANS  AND  MUSIC-LOVERS  19 

at  will  gain  ascendency  over  the  souls  of  men  ;  yet 
we  can  not  bnt  feel  that  a  man  of  wholesomely 
generous  nature  must  needs  reverence  that  which 
can  work  puissantly  upon  his  emotions.  The 
apparent  inaptitude  for  this  feeling  that  some- 
times strikes  us  in  musicians  may  be  explained  by 
the  fact  that  the  musical  laity — deceive  themselves 
as  they  may — are  far  more  prone  to  yield  to  the 
influence  of  the  composer's  or  performer's  per- 
sonality, as  it  is  dimly  revealed  to  them  through 
the  medium  of  tones,  than  they  are  to  listen  to 
the  music  specifically  as  an  entity  in  itself.  The 
musician  is  cautious  about  thus  surrendering  him- 
self, unless  the  strong  individuality  of  the  per- 
former or  composer  is  revealed  to  him  through  a 
perfect  medium.  As  has  been  said  before,  his 
feelings  are  a  much  surer  guide  to  him  than  those 
of  the  amateur,  and  mere  quantity  of  genius  does 
not  command  them  without  a  tacit  protest  on  his 
part  if  he  is  not  sure  of  its  fine  quality. 

It  is  a  mistake  to  think  that  a  high  degree  of 
culture  blunts  the  sensibilities  ;  on  the  contrary, 
it  sharpens  them.  The  musician,  studying  a  Bach 
cantata  in  the  still  solitude  of  his  own  room,  knows 
an  ecstasy  of  which  the  average  music-lover  has 
no  conception ;  and  it  is  the  very  intensity  of  his 
feelings  that  makes  him  careful  how  he  exposes 
them  to  any  but  the  best  and  finest  influences ; 


20  MUSICIANS   AND   MUSIC-LOVERS 

his  soul  is  a  pipe,  the  stops  of  which  must  not  be 
fingered  by  vulgar  hands.  Robert  Schumann  once 
said:  "I  should  box  the  ears  of  any  pupil  who 
wrote  such  harmony  as  the  first  few  measures  of 
the  overture  to  Tannhduser  ;  yet  the  thing  haunts 
me  with  a  strange  persistency  in  spite  of  myself  ! " 
Some  people  would  call  this  obstinacy,  illiberality, 
or  what  not  that  is  bad.  But  it  was  really  the  pro- 
test of  the  refined  Schumann  against  a  power,  the 
genuineness  of  which  he  recognized,  but  of  which 
the  quality  seemed  to  him  open  to  suspicion. 

That  which  we  call  genius  in  general — genius 
schlechtweg,  as  the  Germans  put  it — is  not  so  great 
a  rarity  in  composers  as  might  be  supposed ;  what 
is  far  more  of  a  rarity  is  distinctly  and  specifically 
musical  genius.  Richard  Wagner,  for  example,  is 
a  man  of  unquestionably  great  power,  of  very  un- 
common genius  ;  yet  we  can  not  help  feeling,  when 
studying  his  compositions,  quite  as  surely  as  we 
know  it  from  his  autobiography,  that  it  was  largely 
owing  to  circumstances  that  he  applied  his  genius 
to  music.  We  can  imagine  his  attaining  to  equal 
eminence  in  other  walks  of  life.  But,  in  listening 
to  a  Mozart  quartet,  we  are  sure  Mozart  was  not 
only  a  born  genius,  but  a  born  musician.  To  be 
sure,  the  difference  in  special  musical  training  be- 
tween the  two  men  is  not  to  be  overlooked,  and  is 
all  in  Mozart's  favor ;  but,  if  Wagner's  genius  had 


MUSICIANS   AND   MUSIC-LOVERS  21 

had  the  specifically  musical  quality  of  Mozart's,  we 
can  not  imagine  his  resting  content  until  he  had 
acquired  an  equal  degree  of  musical  culture.  If 
Mozart  had  been  a  man  of  Wagner's  quite  pheno- 
menal general  culture,  no  doubt  his  music  would 
have  shown  the  effects  of  it ;  but  the  difference 
between  the  men  would  still  remain  :  we  should 
still  have  Mozart  seizing  everything  by  its  musical 
side,  making  all  he  had  observed  and  learned  go  to 
further  musical  ends  ;  whereas,  in  Wagner,  we  feel 
that  his  music  is  the  servant  of  his  culture,  that 
the  operation  in  his  case  is  precisely  the  opposite  to 
that  in  Mozart's. 

Innate  power,  whether  general  or  special,  is 
surely  a  precious  thing,  and  must  command  reve- 
rence wherever  it  shows  itself ;  yet,  when  we  find 
an  expression  of  power,  however  genuine,  which  is 
unsymmetric  and  not  wholly  beautiful,  we  may  well 
doubt  if  the  power  itself  be  of  the  highest  kind. 
An  entirely  great  soul  speaks  to  the  world  in  chosen 
language  ;  its  meaning  can  not  be  conveyed  in  slip- 
shod phrases ;  it  has  a  native  nobility  of  its  own 
which  shuns  the  contamination  of  an  ignoble  dia- 
lect, as  a  gentleman  disdains  billingsgate. 

This  has  been  so  well  recognized  that  what  we 
call  the  power  of  expression  is  often  regarded  as  a 
synonym  for  genius.  It  is  just  the  nicer  shades  of 
distinction  between  the  more  or  less  musical  quality 


22  MUSICIANS  AND  MUSIC-LOVERS 

of  genius  which  the  amateur  is,  for  the  most  part, 
unable  to  detect.  When  Schumann  said  of  the 
many  ungainly  passages  in  Berlioz's  Fantastic 
symphony,  that  we  can  appreciate  their  raison 
d'etre  only  by  attempting  to  remodel  them,  and  by 
then  seeing  how  utterly  flat  our  improvements 
sound  when  compared  with  the  original,  he  cer- 
tainly admitted  that  Berlioz  really  had  something 
to  say  in  his  music,  and  that  it  could  be  said  only 
in  his  own  way.  This  is  good  earnest  of  the  genu- 
ineness of  Berlioz's  inspiration,  but  of  its  genuine- 
ness only ;  had  the  afflatus  been  as  fine  as  it  was 
real,  the  ungainliness  of  those  passages  could  not 
have  existed  at  all.  A  high  degree  of  special 
musical  culture  is  rare.  The  world  of  music  the 
musician  lives  in  is  so  little  comprehended  that 
many  of  his  utterances  concerning  his  art  seem 
hardly  to  bear  the  stamp  of  common  sense  and 
reason.  He  may  often  seem  inconsistent,  contra- 
dicting himself  day  by  day,  while  his  apparently 
irreconcilable  remarks  on  different  occasions  really 
supplement  and  complement  each  other,  and  are 
essentially  harmonious  instead  of  contradictory. 

It  is  by  no  means  true  of  the  amateur  that  he  is 
generally  insensible  to  the  bad  effect  of  what  is 
ugly  and  cacophonous  in  music  ;  but  his  feelings 
are  often  shocked  by  what  is  merely  unaccustomed, 
or  by  that  of  which  the  relevancy  is  not  to  be  de- 


MUSICIANS  AND   MUSIC-LOVERS  23 

tected  by  his  uncultivated  power  of  insight.  And 
it  can  not  be  truly  said  that  the  amateur  is  alone 
in  this ;  for  even  the  most  cultivated  musician  at 
times  finds  his  musical  perspicacity  impotent  in 
face  of  the  utterly  new  and  unwonted.  It  is  well 
known  how  most  of  the  great  composers  had  to 
fight  long  and  hard  before  their  genius  was 
acknowledged,  not  only  by  the  world  at  large,  but 
even  by  their  fellow-craftsmen.  It  took  musicians 
themselves  some  time  to  understand  them.  One 
of  the  surest  signs  of  a  composition's  not  being 
understood  is  the  general  complaint  that  it  has  no 
melody.  This  charge  of  lacking  melodic  invention 
has  been  brought  successively  against  every  great 
and  original  composer  who  has  had  to  fight  for  ap- 
preciation and  fame.  At  first  his  works  are  uncom- 
prehended,  and  an  outcry  is  raised  forthwith  that 
he  has  no  melody  in  him  ;  but,  so  soon  as  his  works 
begin  to  be  understood,  this  clamour  ceases  of  itself. 
We  now  smile  to  think  of  the  great  composers 
whom  popular  (and  critical)  blindness  has,  at  one 
time  or  another,  stigmatized  as  no  melodists.  We 
all  can  remember  the  time  when  it  was  the  current 
legend  that  there  was  no  melody  in  Wagner.  And 
mark  the  curious  fact  that  at  that  time  the  works 
in  his  latest  manner  were  wholly  unknown ;  when 
people  used  to  say  there  was  no  melody  in  Wagner, 
they  were  not  thinking  of   Tristan,  the   Nile- 


24  MUSICIANS  AND  MUSIC-LOVERS 

lungen,  or  Parsifal,  but  of  the  Flying  Dutchman, 
Tannhduser,  and  Lohengrin  !  But  people's  find- 
ing no  melody  in  Wagner  is  quite  a  mild  example 
of  melody-blindness.  After  the  first  performance 
of  Berlioz's  Fantastic  symphony  in  Boston,  one  of 
our  newspaper  critics  complained  that  there  was 
no  recognizable  melody  in  the  work.  Now  hear, 
per  contra,  what  M.  Georges  Noufflard,  a  French 
writer  on  music,  says  of  Berlioz,  and  with  especial 
reference  to  the  Fantastic  symphony,  too  : 

"  If,  in  the  symphony,  Berlioz  has  loosed  the  tie  which 
binds  together  the  several  movements,  he  has,  on  the  other 
hand,  given  more  importance  to  melody,  which  was  always 
in  his  eyes  the  only  real  musical  unit." 

But  worse  remains  behind.  I  once  read  in  a 
Paris  paper  a  criticism  on  Weber's  Freischiitz,  in 
which  the  writer  said:  " After  all,  this  merely 
learned  music  touches  me  little  ;  /prefer  melody." 
Here  we  have  it !  No  melody  in  Weber,  of  all  men 
in  the  world  !  But,  oh,  the  irony  of  fate !  For 
was  it  not  this  very  same  Weber  who  once  wrote  of 
Beethoven's  fourth  symphony  that  it  had  no  theme, 
no  development,  no  musical  form,  and  was  nothing 
but  a  mass  of  incoherent,  ear-scorching  harmonies, 
violent  modulations,  noise,  and  sheer  musical 
chaos  ?  Read  Weber's  criticism  on  the  fourth 
symphony,  and  you  will  have  to  rub  your  eyes  and 


MUSICIANS  AND  MUSIC-LOVERS  25 

look  twice,  to  make  sure  you  are  not  reading 
Hanslick  on  Wagner's  Meistersinger  overture  ! 
Some  people  still  talk  in  much  the  same  way  about 
Johannes  Brahms,  and  I  can  remember,  not  twenty 
years  ago,  how  exactly  the  same  things  were  said 
of  Schumann.  In  faith,  the  perspicacity  of  musi- 
cians has  its  bounds,  and  there  are  instances 
enough  in  the  history  of  the  art  of  their  not  see- 
ing what  would  have  bitten  them,  had  it  been  a 
bear.  Musicians,  as  well  as  music-loving  laymen, 
are  amenable  to  the  law  of  mental  inertia ;  only, 
as  a  rule,  they  throw  off  their  inertia  sooner. 

Yet,  leaving  aside  the  domain  of  the  new  and 
unaccustomed,  the  amateur  is  prone  to  reject,  as 
distorted  and  monstrous,  many  things  which  the 
musician  will  readily  accept ;  he  can  not  perceive 
at  a  glance  the  true  relation  of  such  passages  to 
the  remainder  of  the  composition  in  which  they 
occur,  in  virtue  of  which  relation  they  appeal  to 
the  musician  as  beautiful  and  admirable.  Upon 
the  whole,  the  real  or  supposed  faults  that  shock 
the  amateur  are  quite  as  likely  to  be  of  secondary 
importance  as  they  are  to  be  actually  damning; 
the  musician  may  find  them  retrieved  by  pre- 
dominant beauties,  of  which  the  amateur  does  not 
suspect  the  value,  or  else  he  may  consider  them 
so  trivial  in  comparison  with  greater  and  more 
essential  shortcomings,  of  the  existence  of  which 


26  MUSICIANS  AND  MUSIC-LOVERS 

the  amateur  is  equally  unsuspicious,  as  to  make 
them  hardly  worthy  of  notice.  Again,  the 
amateur  may  be  worked  up  to  a  condition  border- 
ing upon  ecstasy  by  certain  beauties  which  the 
musician  appreciates  quite  as  well  as  he,  but 
which,  to  the  cultivated  perception,  are  wholly 
inadequate  to  retrieve  many  fundamental  faults, 
unapparent  to  the  vulgar  ear.  That  it  is,  for  the 
most  part,  utterly  useless  for  the  musician  to 
attempt  to  justify  his  opinion  in  either  case  has 
already  been  hinted.  Music  is  a  subject  on  which 
all  logic  is  wasted ;  at  the  very  best,  the  amateur 
is  persuaded  that  he  ought  to  feel  differently  about 
this  or  that  composition,  but  what  he  actually  does 
feel  will  remain  unchanged,  for  his  musical  li- 
kings and  dislikings  are,  almost  without  exception, 
sheer  cases  of  Dr.  Fell  or  the  opposite. 

I  have  said  that  the  general  music-lover  is  apt 
to  value  music  according  to  the  mood  into  which 
it  throws  him.  There  are  few  persons  at  all  ame- 
nable to  musical  impressions  who  would  not  in- 
dignantly reject  the  insinuation  that  this  mood 
was  not  the  result  of  the  music's  working 
directly  upon  the  higher  sensibilities,  or,  to  use 
the  accepted  phrase,  appealing  directly  to  the 
heart.     But  the  effect  is  often  purely  physical ; l 

I I  here  leave  out  of  the  question  all  purely  scientific  considerations  as 
to  the  physiological  or  unphysiological  and  spiritual  nature  of  psychical 


MUSICIANS   AND  MUSIC-LOVERS  27 

that  is  to  say,  the  effect  of  music  upon  the 
emotional  nature  of  many  men  and  women  is 
analogous  to  the  effects  of  alcohol,  tobacco, 
caffeine,  bromides,  and  other  similar  stimulants 
and  sedatives.  It  is  what  Hanslick  has  aptly 
called  a  pathological  effect.  What  other,  non- 
physical  effect  music  may  have  upon  their  emo- 
tions may  often  be  referred  to  the  force  of  associa- 
tion, and  is  little  determined  by  the  specific 
character  of  the  music  itself. 

In  so  far  as  regards  the  force  of  association,  the 
most  cultured  musician  is  to  a  great  extent  ame- 
nable to  its  influence.  I  know  a  musician  whose 
father  used  to  sing  him  to  sleep,  when  he  was  a  very 
young  child,  by  humming  "  Batti,  batti"  and 
"  Vedrai,  carinoj"  to  this  day,  he  can  not  hear 
either  of  these  melodies, — which,  in  themselves, 
have  little  to  do  with  somnolence, — without  experi- 
encing a  pleasurable  sensation  of  drowsiness.  He 
feels  persuaded  that,  had  any  other  melodies  the 
same  association  for  him,  their  effect  would  be  pre- 
cisely analogous.     But  this  is  only  one  example  of 

phenomena.  For  my  present  purpose  it  is  unnecessary  to  decide  whether 
music,  as  such,  is  (as  Hanslick  says)  a  purely  physical  phenomenon 
that  can  appeal  directly  only  to  the  senses,  or  whether  it  is  (as  according 
to  Schopenhauer  and  Wagner)  an  immediate  manifestation  of  the  meta- 
physical essence  (Ding  an  sich)  of  the  universe.  It  is  sufficiently  accu- 
rate here  to  use  the  expressions,  "  appealing  to  the  heart "  and  "  appeal* 
ing  to  the  senses,"  as  they  are  understood  in  common  parlance. 


28  MUSICIANS  AND  MUSIC-LOVERS 

the  force  of  association  in  music ;  there  are  other 
ways  in  which  it  is  felt,  and  in  which  it  has  a  much 
stronger  influence  upon  the  general  music-lover 
than  upon  the  musician.  The  title  of  a  composi- 
tion, !  the  conditions  under  ^  hich  it  was  written,  the 
effect  it  is  known  to  have  had  upon  this  or  that 
notable  person,  in  short,  any  romantic  circum- 
stance connected  with  it,  can  exert  an  influence 
upon  the  emotions  of  which  the  music,  by  itself, 
would  often  be  incapable.  The  music  only  tends 
to  heighten  and  vivify  an  idea  which  has  already 
gained  ascendency  over  the  listener's  feelings. 

How  strong  this  force  of  association  of  ideas  is 
may  be  judged  from  the  manner  in  which  the 
greater  number  of  music-lovers  express  themselves 
when  speaking  of  music,  and  by  the  compositions 
that  have  won  the  largest  share  of  quasi-sentimental 
notoriety.  If  a  novelist,  public  speaker,  preacher, 
lecturer,  or  other  not  specially  musical  person  (sup- 
posing him  to  know  enough  not  to  go  into  maudlin 
raptures  over  the  ^Eolian  harp)  have  occasion  to 
refer  casually  to  a  musical  composition,  you  may 
be  pretty  sure  it  will  be  either  Beethoven's  Pas- 
toral symphony  or  Mozart's  Requiem  ;  if  not  these, 
it  will  be  the  (so-called)  Moonlight  sonata,  or  per- 
haps the  thunder-storm  piece  of  the  Freiburg  or- 

1  Let  the  reader  only  think  of  the  influence  upon  the  imagination  of  so- 
called  program-music  I 


MUSICIANS   AND  MUSIC-LOVERS  29 

ganist,  or  else  something  for  the  vox  humana  stop. 
Now,  without  calling  into  question  the  intrinsic 
value  of  the  Pastoral  symphony,  it  is  by  no  means 
the  one  of  the  glorious  nine  most  calculated  to 
captivate  the  popular  taste  in  a  purely  musical  way ; 
there  is  little  in  it,  as  music,  to  entitle  it  to  the 
singular  prominence  its  name  has  acquired.  But 
it  has  a  peasant's  dance,  a  thunder-storm,  a  break- 
ing forth  of  sunshine  through  the  clouds,  rust- 
ling leaves,  murmuring  brooks,  nightingales,  and 
cuckoos  ;  it  is  interwoven  with  all  sorts  of  rural 
associations,  things  that  can  be  easily  talked  about, 
and  call  up  remembrances  that  can  be  definitely 
placed  in  our  consciousness.  In  speaking  of  the 
Pastoral  symphony,  the  non-musician  feels  that  he 
is  treading  on  not  entirely  unknown  ground.  As  for 
Mozart's  Requiem,  probably  not  one  out  of  a  hun- 
dred persons  who  admiringly  mention  its  name 
has  ever  heard  a  note  of  it,  or  knows  the  first  thing 
about  it,  save  that  it  was  the  composer's  last 
great  work,  written  at  a  time  when  he  was  in  sore 
trouble  and  misery.  Its  sublimity  is  taken  for 
granted ;  it  is  not  reverenced  so  much  for  its 
musical  worth,  as  because  it  was  the  swan-song  of 
a  great  and  suffering  man. 

Influences  of  this  sort,  so  all-powerful  with  the 
great  mass  of  men,  are  almost  without  effect  upon 
the  musician.     He  looks  upon  music  as  music  ;  the 


30  MUSICIANS  AND   MUSIC-LOVERS 

most  perfect  orchestral  thunder-storm  in  the  world 
leaves  him  cold  and  indifferent  if  it  is  not  at  the 
same  time  a  fine  piece  of  composition  ;  he  does  not 
admire  a  phrase  because  it  cunningly  imitates  the 
babbling  of  a  brook,  but  because  it  is  beautiful 
music.  The  ordinary  music-lover,  in  speaking  of 
music,  is  eager  to  fix  his  impressions  by  the  aid  of 
metaphors  and  similes  taken  from  the  other  arts 
or  from  every-day  life ;  the  musician  speaks  of  the 
entrance  of  themes,  modulations,  trombone  pas- 
sages, and  the  like.  In  the  hundreds  of  conversa- 
tions I  have  had  with  musicians  about  music  I  can 
remember  only  a  single  instance  of  a  cultivated 
musician's  laying  stress  upon  an  extrinsic  beauty 
in  a  composition ;  and  that  was  when  Dr.  Hans 
von  Bulow,  speaking  of  Raff's  Im  Wdlde  symphony, 
said :  "  Oh,  that  setting-in  of  the  gray  morning 
twilight  in  the  finale  is  overpoweringly  impres- 
sive ! "  That  was  the  only  time  in  my  life  I  ever 
heard  a  musician  speak  of  music  in  such  fashion. 
In  writing  about  music,  Eichard  Wagner  and  Hec- 
tor Berlioz  have  at  times  indulged  themselves  in 
this  sort  of  simile ;  but  even  Berlioz,  the  chief  of 
"  program-composers/'  wrote  at  the  end  of  the  de- 
scriptive preface  to  his  Fantastic  symphony  that 
the  distribution  of  the  "  program  "  among  the  au- 
dience might  be  optional  with  the  conductor,  as 
he  hoped  the  symphony  itself  would  have  sufii- 


MUSICIANS   AND   MUSIC-LOVEKS  31 

cient  musical  interest  to  stand  on  its  own  merits  as 
a  composition,  apart  from  the  dramatic  story  with 
which  it  was  connected.  As  a  foil  to  what  I  have 
told  of  the  "  twilight"  in  BaiFs  symphony,  let  me 
give  an  instance  of  an  opposite  character.  Not 
long  ago  I  was  reading  through  the  second  finale 
in  Don  Giovanni  with  Mr.  Otto  Dresel ;  all  of  a 
sudden  he  stopped  playing,  and  cried  out  :  "Do 
you  know,  it  takes  a  confounded  amount  of  genius 
to  have  thought  of  bringing  in  that  figure  again 
just  here  !  And  it  is  only  by  a  common  deceptive 
cadence,  too  ! n  Nobody  but  a  musician  could 
have  expressed  himself  so. 

It  is  a  pretty  widespread  notion  that  the  uncul- 
tured music-lover  stands  in  the  same  relation  to 
inferior  music  that  the  musician  does  to  the  great 
masterworks  of  the  art ;  that  the  musician  enjoys, 
say,  Beethoven's  A  major  symphony  or  Bach's 
Passacaglia  in  the  same  way  and  to  the  same  extent 
that  other  people  enjoy  the  overture  to  Martha  or 
even  Bardazewska's  Maiden's  Prayer.  As  it  is 
impossible  to  get  any  direct  evidence  on  this  point, 
inasmuch  as  we  can  not  enter  into  the  consciousness 
of  two  persons  at  once  and  listen  with  their  ears, 
we  can  found  our  judgment  only  on  the  various 
emotional  phenomena  we  observe  in  either  class  of 
listeners.  There  can  be  little  doubt,  however,  that 
A's  mental  attitude  toward  the  A  major  symphony, 


32  MUSICIANS   AND   MUSIC-LOVERS 

and  B's  toward  the  overture  to  Martha,  are  very 
similar  in  some  respects ;  bnt  in  others  they  are 
probably  very  different.  A  musician,  after  hearing 
a  great  work,  does  not,  as  a  rule,  care  to  have  it 
immediately  repeated.1  If  he  sees  the  same  com- 
position on  a  concert  program  next  day,  it  will 
probably  not  attract  him  more  than  would  any 
other  piece  of  equal  merit.  But  his  enjoyment  of 
the  work  lasts  him  a  lifetime ;  it  increases  with 
every  successive  hearing,  if  the  performance  be  a 
good  one ;  the  composition  is  a  well  of  delight  to 
him  that  can  never  run  dry.  But  when  the  ordi- 
nary music-lover  hears  a  piece  of  music  that  par- 
ticularly pleases  him  he  generally  wishes  to  hear 
it  over  again,  and  that,  too,  instanter;  he  will 
listen  to  it,  day  in  and  day  out,  till  he  gets  tho- 
roughly sick  of  it,  and  never  wishes  to  hear  it 
more.  He  sucks  and  sucks  at  his  musical  orange 
until  nothing  but  the  dry  peel  is  left,  and  then 
throws  it  away.  It  is,  in  general,  only  pleasures 
of  the  sensual  sort  which  thus  lure  men  on  to 
immediate  excess,  and  then  pall  on  them  after  a 
while. 

There  is,  no  doubt,  a  strong  sensual  element  in 
the  musician's  enjoyment  of  music ;  but  he  is  not 

1 1  am  here  supposing  a  case  in  which  the  musician  listens  to  music 
solely  and  simply  for  the  sake  of  musical  enjoyment,  not  in  order  to  study 
a  composition. 


MUSICIANS   AND   MUSIC-LOVEES  33 

content  with  this  alone  :  his  finely  strung  nature 
protests  against  yielding  completely  to  the  influ- 
ence of  music  which  he  suspects  of  having  a  merely 
ephemeral  hold  on  his  emotions.  He  tastes  it, 
as  it  were,  and  enjoys  its  flavour,  but  is  careful  to 
stop  short  when  there  is  danger  of  intoxication, 
for  that  brings  on  headache  and  other  undesirable 
discomforts.  He  enjoys  music  as  an  art,  as  some- 
thing in  itself  grand  and  beautiful,  not  as  a  sti- 
mulant nor  an  anodyne.  That  music  can  act  in 
both  these  capacities  has  already  been  said,  but 
the  musician  seldom  uses  it  in  either.  The  simile 
between  music  and  wine  is  an  old  one,  and  there 
is  more  truth  in  it  than  some  recent  theorists 
would  have  us  believe  ;  it  does  not  cover  the  whole 
ground,  but  it  covers  part  of  it  very  well.  There 
is  an  enjoyment  of  wine  that  is  not  entirely  sen- 
sual, for  it  calls  into  play  the  powers  of  compari- 
son and  judgment.  The  connoisseur  and  the  boor 
enjoy  it  in  quite  different  ways ;  the  pleasure  the 
one  gets  from  fourth-rate  whiskey  is  not  that 
which  the  other  gets  from  fine  Roman6e-Conti. 
The  connoisseur  delights  in  the  wine  itself,  in  its 
flavour  and  bouquet,  the  boor  revels  in  its  effect ; 
and  the  latter  enjoyment  to  a  certain  extent  pre- 
cludes the  possibility  of  the  former.  Substituting 
music  for  wine,  we  have  a  good  example  of  the 
relative  points  of  view  of  the  musician  and  the 
3 


34  MUSICIANS   AND  MUSIC-LOVERS 

musical  layman.  The  difference  between  them 
lies  not  so  much  in  the  class  of  music  they  re- 
spectively enjoy  as  in  the  way  they  enjoy  it. 

It  is  not  easy  to  decide  which  one  of  the  con- 
stituent elements  of  our  modern  music  1 — such  as 
rhythm,  melody,  clang-tint,  movement,  harmony, 
counterpoint,  thematic  development,  and  symmetry 
of  form — appeals  most  directly  to  the  majority  of 
music-lovers.  If  the  question  were  put,  the  answer 
would  probably  be,  in  nine  cases  out  of  ten,  melody. 
Yet  considerable  self-deception  may  exist  on  this 
as  on  other  points.  No  doubt  the  average  ear  de- 
mands a  quality  in  music  which  it  can  recognize  as 
pleasingly  melodious  ;  this  is  almost  a  conditio  sine 
qua  non.  But  I  think  sheer  quality  of  sound, 
what  is  nowadays  called  clang-tint,  has,  in  general, 
greater  power  over  the  emotions  of  the  music-loving 
public  than  melody  pure  and  simple.  And  be  it 
remembered  that  this  power  is  wholly  physical.  A 
grand  and  imposing  sonority,  a  well-timed  crescendo 
or  diminuendo,  have  such  command  over  the  ner- 
vous excitability  of  most  persons  as  often  com- 
pletely to  silence  their  habitual  demand  for  purely 
melodic  effects.  The  choruses,  "  Crucify  Him," 
in  Mendelssohn's  Christus,  with  their  overwhelm- 

1 1  use  the  term  modern  as  denoting  music  written  in  the  modern  tonal 
system,  in  distinction  from  music  written  in  the  old  so-called  church 
modes. 


MUSICIANS  AND   MUSIC-LOVERS  35 

ing  effects  of  sonority  and  almost  total  lack  of  what 
is  commonly  called  melody,  have  many  more  sin- 
cere admirers  than  the  corresponding  turbcB  in 
Bach's  St.  Matthew-Passion,  in  which  the  dramatic 
effect  resides  almost  wholly  in  the  melodic  charac- 
ter of  the  theme  itself.  Last  winter  a  volunteer 
correspondent  of  one  of  our  newspapers  evidently 
thought  he  had  suggested  a  conclusive  reply  to  the 
objections  made  by  some  critics  to  Verdi's  Requiem 
— on  the  ground  that  the  music  depended  too 
much  on  sheer  effects  of  sonority — by  asking  the 
question  :  "  Did  it  ever  occur  to  some  people  how 
difficult  it  is  to  score  a  really  grand  and  noble 
noise  ? "  When  Goldmark's  Sakuntala  overture 
was  played  for  the  third  or  fourth  time  in  Boston, 
a  listener  who  sat  in  front  of  me  turned  round  after 
the  performance  and  said  :  "  Say  what  you  please, 
your  Haydns  and  Mozarts  and  Beethovens  couldn't 
give  you  a  glorious  mass  of  orchestral  tone  like 
that!" 

The  first  thing  most  people  notice  in  a  singer  is 
whether  he  has  a  fine  voice  or  not,  and  their  opinion 
of  his  merit  is  commonly  based  on  its  quality.     Ask 

the  first  person  you  meet  if  he  thinks  Signor  X 

sings  well ;  he  will  answer,  "  Yes,  I  think  he  has 
a  beautiful  voice;"  or  else,  "No,  his  voice  is 
wretched."  The  absurd  questions  one  hears  put 
every  day,  such  as,  "  Do  you  prefer  instrumental 


36  MUSICIANS  AND  MUSIC-LOVERS 

or  vocal  music  ? "  and  the  equally  unmusical 
statements,  like,  "  I  hate  an  orchestra,  but  I  adore 
a  brass  band," — the  more  pallid  terms  like  and 
dislike  are  seldom  used  in  such  cases, — all  tend 
to  show  how  great  the  power  of  mere  quality  of 
sound  is,  and  how  strongly  it  affects  the  musical 
likings  and  dislikings  of  most  people.  This  is 
also  proved  by  the  singular  popularity  of  instru- 
ments of  novel  or  otherwise  striking  sonority, 
such  as  the  xylophone,  Glockenspiel,  set  of  finger- 
bowls,  flowerpotophone,  and  what  not.  Some  peo- 
ple will  hardly  notice  a  tune  when  played  on  a 
pianoforte  or  by  an  orchestra,  but  will  go  into  ec- 
stasies over  the  same  tune — especially  if  it  be  of 
a  grandiose  and  majestic  character — when  played 
on  the  mouth  harmonica  ;  experto  crede,  I  have 
seen  it  myself ! 

That  the  effect  of  quality  of  sound  per  se  is 
purely  physical  is  none  the  less  true  because  it  has 
a  strong  influence  over  the  emotions ;  a  beautiful 
tone  may  even  provoke  tears.  I  know  a  contralto 
singer  who  can  bring  tears  into  some  eyes  simply 
by  singing  a  long-sustained  A ;  and  singers  in  ge- 
neral are  fond  of  talking  about  "  throwing  the  tears 
into  their  voices."  Yes,  there  are  tears  in  voices 
— and  in  onions  and  cat-o'-nine-tails,  too  ;  but  in 
many  cases  they  spring  from  ahe^  nervous  irrita- 
tion.    Indubitably  a  melody  can,  of  itself,  appeal 


MUSICIANS  AND  MUSIC-LOVERS  37 

directly  to  the  heart.1  But  the  question  is  not  so 
much  what  a  melody  can  do,  as  what  it  actually 
does  do  in  the  majority  of  cases.  To  make  an  ex- 
periment :  take  one  of  the  most  perspicuous,  beau- 
tiful, and  heart-moving  melodies  in  existence,  the 
one  beginning  with  the  words,  "  D'un  pensiero, 
d'un  accento  rea  non  sono,"  in  the  second  finale  of 
Bellini's  Sonnambula;  let  it  be  sung  with  fairly 
correct  expression  and  finish  of  phrasing  by  a  voice 
in  no  way  distinguished  by  beauty  of  timbre.  In 
an  average  audience  the  greater  number  of  lis- 
teners will  be  little  moved  by  it.  But  let  it  be 
sung  by  a  voice  of  great  richness,  and  especially 
of  fine  vibrating  quality,  and  nearly  the  whole 
audience  will  be  deeply  affected.  There  is  an  or- 
chestral arrangement  of  Schubert's  Stdndchen  that 
used  to  be  in  vogue  some  years  ago,  in  which  the 
melody  is  repeated  by  various  solo  instruments.  I 
have  always  noticed  that  in  this  piece  the  'cello 
and  oboe  left  the  audience  comparatively  cold 
and  unsympathetic ;  but,  when  the  cornet's  turn 
came,  nearly  every  one  was  aroused  to  a  high  pitch 
of  excitement.  The  melody  was  the  same,  but 
the  thrilling  tone  of  the  cornet  was  what  moved 
the  public.2 

1  The  reader  will  bear  in  mind  that  I  still  use  this  expression  in  its  com* 
mon  acceptation,  not  with  scientific  strictness. 

3  How  intimately  the  e  r^oyment  of  sheer  quality  of  tone  is  connected  in 
the  minds  of  most  people  with  their  appreciation  of  melody  may  also  be 


38  MUSICIANS  AND   MUSIC-LOVERS 

But  people  will  say :  Is  then  onr  enjoyment  of 
music  no  more  than  our  enjoyment  of  champagne  ? 
Are  our  cherished  ideas  of  pathos,  sentiment,  and 
the  whole  great  art  of  tones  tugging  at  our  heart- 
strings a  mere  delusion  after  all  ?  By  no  manner 
of  means  !  Hearts  are  touched,  tears  do  flow, 
from  other  causes  than  mere  nervous  excitement. 
The  self-deception  is  not  about  the  result,  but 
about  the  cause  ;  in  innumerable  cases  it  is  not  so 
much  the  music  itself  that  touches  the  music- 
lover's  heart  as  it  is  the  performer.  His  pathos, 
sentiment,  or  passion  speaks  directly  to  the  hearts 
of  his  hearers ;  so  powerful  is  his  influence  that 
he  can  at  times  make  many  a  listener  forget  for 
the  moment  the  whole  sensuous  effect  of  music  he 
commonly  prizes  so  highly.  I  have  heard  a  singer 
whose  voice  may  be  said  to  realize  the  neplus  ultra 
of  unmusical  harshness,  and  whose  singing,  judged 
from  an  artistic  point  of  view,  is  simply  atrocious  ; 
yet  she  seldom  fails  royally  to  command  the  emo- 
tions of  her  hearers  by  the  sheer  intensity  of  her 
dramatic  power  of  expression.  What  she  sings 
matters  little ;  she  is  almost  invariably  sure  of 
enthusiastic  applause.  This  is,  to  be  sure,  an  ex- 
treme case,  but  by  no  means  unprecedented. 

Do  not  think  I  attribute  too  great  weight  to  the 

judged  from  the  very  common  (but,  to  the  musician,  meaningless)  ex- 
pression :  So-and-so  has  a  melodious  voice. 


MUSICIANS  AND   MUSIC-LOVERS  39 

part  the  performer's  personality  and  executive 
talent  play  in  the  effect  music  has  upon  the  ave- 
rage listener.  Only  think,  for  one  thing,  of  the 
positively  enormous  place  the  virtuoso  fills  and 
ever  has  filled  in  popular  estimation  ;  think  of  the 
numbers  of  people  who  are  drawn  to  concerts,  and 
at  the  highest  prices,  too,  when  a  world-famous 
singer's  or  player's  name  is  down  on  the  program  ! 
For  what,  think  you,  does  the  average  music-lover 
look  first,  when  he  reads  the  advertisement  of  a 
concert  in  the  newspaper  ?  In  ninety-nine  cases 
out  of  a  hundred  he  looks  first  to  see  who  is  to 
be  the  solo  performer  ;  what  the  program  is  to  be 
interests  him  only  secondarily.  Show  me  the  man 
who  looks  first  to  see  what  is  to  be  played  or  sung, 
and  I  will  hold  him  in  my  very  heart  of  heart — as 
a  music-lover  who  deserves  to  be  a  musician  ! 

I  have  spoken  of  the  chief  and  most  characteris- 
tic difference  between  the  musician's  listening  to 
music  and  the  ordinary  music-lover's  hearing  it, 
as  being  a  difference  in  the  exertion  of  what  I  call 
the  power  of  musical  observation.  I  have  also 
said  that  the  way  in  which  the  musician  listens  to 
the  higher  and  more  complex  forms  of  music,  and 
the  average  layman  who  is  really  musical  by  nature 
listens  to  the  lower  and  simpler  forms,  is,  in  some 
respects,  one  and  the  same ;  that  the  naturally 
musical  layman  instinctively  exerts  his  power  of 


40  MUSICIANS   AND   MUSIC-LOVERS 

musical  observation,  as  far  as  it  will  go,  and  gives 
np  the  attempt  to  grasp  the  meaning  of  a  com- 
position only  when  he  finds  it  hopeless.  And  I 
would  now  insist  especially  on  what  seems  to  me 
an  all-important  point :  that  the  best  and  possi- 
bly the  only  way  for  the  musical  layman  to  turn 
himself  into  a  musician — at  least  in  so  far  as  re- 
gards listening  to  and  appreciating  great  music — 
is  for  him  to  cultivate  and  develop  his  power  of 
musical  observation. 

We  all  possess  the  power  of  observation  to  a  cer- 
tain extent ;  but  too  few  of  us  have  taken  the 
trouble  to  develop  it.  And  there  can  be  little 
doubt  that  the  process  is,  notably  in  its  first 
stages,  a  laborious  one.  Agassiz,  the  naturalist, 
once  gave  a  pupil  of  his  a  fish  to  look  at,  with  di- 
rections to  make  a  catalogue  of  all  the  interesting 
points  he  could  observe  in  it.  After  an  hour  or 
so  the  pupil  returned  with  the  fish  and  catalogue, 
and  asked  :  "  What  next  ?"  "  Oh  !  go  back  again 
and  look  at  your  fish  some  more,"  was  the  reply. 
Next  day  the  pupil  brought  in  a  longer  list  of  in- 
teresting items,  but  with  no  better  result.  On  the 
third  day  the  Professor  looked  through  the  cata- 
logue more  carefully  than  before  ;  but,  after  con- 
sidering with  himself  for  a  while,  said  :  "  Very 
good,  my  young  friend,  very  good  indeed  !  And 
now — well  !  if  you  seriously  mean  to  be  a  natura- 


MUSICIANS   AND   MUSIC-LOVERS  41 

list,  really  the  best  thing  you  can  do  is  to  go  back 
to  your  fish  and  look  at  him  some  more  !  *  It 
takes  time  to  form  the  habit  of  observation,  espe- 
cially in  so  fleeting  and  elusive  a  matter  as  music  ; 
and  that  there  can  be  no  really  artistic  and  ap- 
preciative enjoyment  of  music  without  a  pretty 
distinct  perception  of  what  it  is  like  is  evident 
enough.  The  more  laborious  this  perception,  the 
greater  the  conscious  effort  to  grasp  the  outlines  of 
a  composition,  the  less  will  be  our  enjoyment  of 
it.  Too  many  people  stand  in  much  the  same 
relation  to  music  that  a  certain  Bey  of  Tunis  did 
to  the  pictorial  art.  As  a  good  and  conservative 
Mahometan,  this  worthy  Bey's  experience  in  pic- 
tures had  been  confined  to  the  arabesque  drawings 
for  which  his  nation  is  famous.  But  one  day, 
while  he  was  making  a  call  of  ceremony  upon  an 
English  officer,  an  illustration  in  the  Illustrated 
London  News,  a  copy  of  which  happened  to  be  lying 
on  the  table,  caught  his  eye  ;  he  took  up  the  paper, 
looked  at  the  picture  intently,  turned  the  page 
first  one  way  up  and  then  the  other,  but  evidently 
could  make  nothing  of  it.  At  last  a  gleam  of  in- 
telligence flashed  across  his  puzzled  face ;  putting 
his  fore-finger  upon  a  figure  in  the  picture,  he 
turned  to  the  Englishman  and  said,  with  unfeigned 
delight  at  his  own  perspicacity  :  "  Man  ! "  We 
all  must  have  noticed  a  similar  process  of  laborious 


42  MUSICIANS  AND   MUSIC-LOVERS 

observation  in  very  young  children  when  they 
look  at  a  picture.  Some  rudimentary  intellects 
never  quite  master  this  first  difficulty.  I  had  an 
old  nurse  who  never  could  be  taught  to  tell  whether 
a  picture  was  right  side  up  or  upside  down  ;  it  was 
all  one  to  her.  Had  she  known  the  phrase,  she 
would  probably  have  called  it  a  "bit  of  colour." 
In  the  same  way  musical  form,  if  at  all  complex, 
is  as  nothing  to  the  perception  of  many  a  sin- 
cere music-lover ;  the  trouble  often  is  that  he 
knows  neither  what  to  look  for  nor  how  to  look 
for  it. 

Now,  to  what  point  does  the  musician  first  direct 
his  power  of  observation  ?  "What  element  in  a  sym- 
phonic movement,'  a  fugue,  or  any  of  the  larger  forms 
of  composition,  does  his  ear  instinctively  seek  to 
grasp  ?  Just  the  very  same  element  that  any  little" 
bootblack's  ear  tries  to  grasp  in  Yankee  Doodle  or 
Home,  sweet  home,  namely  :  what  is  vulgarly  called 
the  tune.  I  have  spoken  of  the  never-failing  ge- 
neral outcry  against  new  and  original  composers, 
that  they  have  no  melodic  inspiration  ;  practically 
the  same  charge  is  brought  against  the  more  complex 
forms  of  music  by  the  uncultivated  music-lover : 
that  they  have  no  tune  !  The  frequency  of  this 
complaint  shows  how  exceedingly  difficult  it  is  for 
many  people  to  grasp  the  melodic  essence,  or  tune, 
of  a  composition,  even  though  it  lie  on  the  very 


MUSICIANS  AND   MUSIC-LOVEKS  43 

surface,  whenever  the  form  of  melody  is  of  an  un- 
accustomed character.  Indeed,  a  large  number  of 
persons  refuse  to  recognize  as  a  melody  anything 
which  has  not  what  the  French  call  the  regular 
carrure,  or  square  cut.  For  them  a  melody,  to  be 
recognizable  as  such,  must  consist  of  four  sections, 
each  section  being  four  measures  long,  and  a  dis- 
tinct cadence  falling  at  the  end  of  the  second  and 
fourth  sections.  This  is  the  pattern  on  which  are 
fashioned  most  of  the  popular  tunes  you  hear 
whistled  in  the  streets  or  ground  out  on  hand- 
organs  ;  it  is  also  the  type  of  some  of  the  most  dis- 
tinguished and  divinely  beautiful  melodies  ever 
written.  It  may,  in  a  sense,  be  called  the  perfect 
type  of  melody, — perfect,  because  a  melody,  so 
constructed,  is  a  complete  organic  whole  in  itself. 
Such  a  melody  catches  the  ear  easily  ;  its  organic 
character  is  so  very  patent,  the  relation  one  phrase 
or  section  in  it  bears  to  another  is  so  self-evident, 
that  it  takes  an  exceedingly  slight  effort  of  musical 
observation  to  grasp  its  outline  and  a  correspond- 
ingly trifling  effort  of  memory  to  retain  it.  It  is 
understood,  so  to  speak,  at  a  glance.  But,  if  the 
field  of  musical  composition  were  restricted  to  the 
production  of  such  melodies,  this  field  would  be 
narrowly  circumscribed  indeed  !  The  plastic  es- 
sence of  all  the  larger  and  nobler  musical  forms  is 
the  development  of  one  or  more  melodic  phrases, 


44  MUSICIANS  AND   MUSIC-LOVERS 

technically  called  themes,  into  a  composition  of 
considerable  length. 

Now,  every  composition,  as  has  been  said,  must, 
as  a  work  of  art,  have  a  distinctly  organic  charac- 
ter ;  and  it  may  be  said,  in  general,  that  what  is 
true  of  all  organisms  is,  and  must  be,  true  of 
really  organic  music,  namely,  that  no  single  part 
or  member  of  the  whole  structure  is  a  complete 
and  independent  entity  in  itself.  The  human  body 
is  not  composed,  as  a  certain  philosopher  more  than 
half  surmised  it  was,  of  an  infinite  number  of  infi- 
nitely small  human  bodies  held  together  by  some 
mysterious  bond  of  federation  ;  it  is  the  sum  total 
of  all  its  various  members  and  organs,  each  one  of 
which  is  important  only  in  so  far  as  it  performs  its 
allotted  functions  in  the  cooperative  work  of  main- 
taining the  well-being  of  the  whole  system.  And 
a  member's  being  thus  able  to  perform  its  func- 
tional part  in  the  general  scheme  depends,  in  a 
great  measure,  on  its  very  incompleteness  in  itself. 
A  self -sufficient  leg,  for  instance,  which  could  feed 
itself,  care  for  its  own  needs,  walk  down-town  by 
itself,  and  in  time  become  the  parent  of  other 
equally  accomplished  legs,  might  be  an  extremely 
interesting  and  even  beautiful  entity ;  but  it  would 
probably  make  a  rather  restive  and  unmanageable 
limb  for  ordinary  use  as  a  leg.  In  the  larger 
forms  of  composition  we  likewise  often  find  that 


MUSICIANS  AND   MUSIC-LOVERS  45 

the  melodies  composers  take  for  themes,  that  is,  as 
germs  from  which  their  compositions  are  to  be  or- 
ganically developed,  have  not  that  absolutely 
square  cut,  that  perfect  completeness  in  themselves, 
which  is  to  be  noted  in  tunes  of  the  more  popular 
sort.  An  already  complete  organic  whole  may 
indeed  grow,  but  it  can  hardly  be  said  to  develop  ; 
it  is  the  incomplete  germ,  or  embryo,  that  deve- 
lops. 

In  music  a  good  deal  of  what  is  technically 
called  thematic  treatment  consists  in  cutting  up 
the  primary  melody,  or  theme,  in  resolving  it  into 
its  prime  factors.  And  this  process  of  dismember- 
ment is  often  of  exceedingly  difficult  application 
to  organically  complete  melodies.  That  which, 
when  done  to  a  less  fully  organized  theme, 
seems  an  interesting  dissection  and  analysis, 
strikes  us  as  an  unwelcome  mutilation,  when 
performed  upon  a  complete  and  self-sufficient 
melody.  Thus  many  of  the  finest  melodies 
ever  written  would  make  poorish  themes  for 
extended  musical  treatment,  while  many  of  the 
grandest  themes  in  the  great  masterpieces  of  music 
have  comparatively  little  meaning  and  interest  in 
themselves.  It  is  just  this  lack  of  organic  com- 
pleteness, of  absolute  regularity  of  cut,  in  the  the- 
matic material  on  which  much  of  the  greatest  mu- 
sic is  based,   that  makes  the  perception  of   its 


46  MUSICIANS  AND   MUSIC-LOVERS 

melodic  outline  a  matter  of  such  difficulty  to 
people  whose  power  of  musical  observation  has 
been  but  little  cultivated.  But,  whether  patent  or 
abstruse,  the  melodic  outline  is  really  there  in  al- 
most every  case  ;  it  only  depends  on  your  musical 
perspicacity  to  discover  it.  And  until  you  have 
discovered  it  the  composition  will  be  a  sealed  book 
to  you. 

Of  course  the  distinct  recognition  of  a  melody  is 
but  the  first  step  toward  musical  appreciation ; 
rightly  to  estimate  its  value,  its  properness  to  play 
its  allotted  part  in  a  composition,  implies  far  more. 
In  regard  to  the  appreciation  of  melody  in  general, 
it  may  be  said  that  most  people  prize  a  melody 
more  for  its  sensuous  or  emotional  quality  than  for 
its  thematic  value.  They  are  prone  to  consider  its 
immediate  effect  upon  the  ear,  or  its  dramatic 
power  over  the  emotions,  of  more  importance  than 
its  containing  in  itself  the  germs  of  a  stoutly  and 
symmetrically  articulated  composition.1    This  is 

1  The  same  may  be  said  of  the  popular  appreciation  of  harmonic  ef- 
fects. The  average  music-lover  delights  in  the  immediate  effect  upon  the 
ear  of  certain  chords  or  combinations  of  tones— such  as,  for  instance,  the 
dominant  7th  and  9th,  or  the  double  appoggiatura  of  the  9th  and  11th 
over  the  sub-dominant— while  he  has,  as  a  rule,  but  little  appreciation  of 
that  subtile  connection  between  a  symmetric  sequence  of  chords  where- 
in the  true  value  of  a  fine  progression  lies.  He  prizes  a  chord  or  modu- 
lation for  its  own  sake,  without  regard  for  its  function  as  an  organic  part 
of  the  harmonic  structure,  nor  for  the  circumstances  under  which  it  pre- 
sents itself. 


MUSICIANS   AND   MUSIC-LOVERS  47 

perhaps  one  of  the  reasons  for  the  great  popularity 
of  much  of  the  music  of  the  present  day  with  a 
large  class  of  music-lovers.  Although  our  contem- 
porary music  is  perhaps  not  so  fertile  in  merely 
ear-pleasing  melody  as  was  that  of  an  earlier  period, 
it  can  not  be  denied  that  it  is,  in  general,  rich  in 
more  or  less  melodic  phrases  of  intensely  dramatic 
character,  which  are  violently  exciting  in  a  ner- 
vous way.  And  it  is  by  no  means  impossible  that 
the  besetting  tendency  of  much  of  this  music  to- 
ward incoherency  and  confusedness  is  not  wholly 
the  result  of  want  of  skill  in  thematic  treatment  in 
contemporary  composers,  nor  of  the  complexity  of 
the  tasks  they  sometimes  impose  upon  themselves ; 
it  may  also  be  in  great  part  explained  by  the  in- 
trinsically unthematic  character  of  many  of  their 
melodies.  These  melodies  appeal  strongly  to  the 
emotions, — whether  through  the  heart  or  through 
the  nerves  matters  not, — but  they  too  seldom  con- 
tain in  themselves  the  germs  of  an  orderly  compo- 
sition ;  and  the  lack  of  this  latter  quality  is  the 
one  of  all  others  the  average  music-lover  is  the  last 
to  feel.  The  theme  of  Bach's  G  minor  fugue  is  not, 
of  and  by  itself,  so  stimulating  as  the  melody  of 
Verdi's  "  Di  quella  pira  ;  "  yet  Bach's  apparently 
homely  phrase  contains  in  itself  the  "  potency  and 
power"  of  the  whole  glorious  G  minor  fugue, 
whereas  Verdi's  tune  contains  the  potency  and 


48  MUSICIANS  AND  MUSIC-LOVERS 

power  of  absolutely  nothing  beyond  its  own  screech- 
ing self. 

The  melodic  phrase  once  perceived  by  the  ear, 
or,  as  I  have  called  it,  the  tune  once  caught,  the 
next  thing  to  do  is  to  fix  it  firmly  in  the  me- 
mory, that  it  may  be  recognized  again  at  its  every 
reappearance,  that  even  its  smallest  component  fi- 
gures may  be  seen  to  be  derived  from  and  belong 
to  it.  To  have  sharpened  one's  power  of  mu- 
sical observation  to  this  pitch  of  keenness  is 
to  have  done  much, — much,  but  not  all  !  Such 
chasing  a  theme  through  the  mazes  of  a  composi- 
tion, and  recognizing  it  wherever  you  can  catch  a 
glimpse  of  it,  is  essentially  a  musical  process,  if  an 
elementary  one.  It  is  rather  like  Joe  Gargery's 
reading.  "  Give  me/'  said  Joe,  "  a  good  book  or 
a  good  newspaper,  and  sit  me  down  afore  a  good 
fire,  and  I  ask  no  better.  Lord  !  when  you  do 
come  at  last  to  a  J  and  a  0,  and,  says  you,  f  Here, 
at  last,  is  a  J-0,  Joe/  how  interesting  reading  is! n 
And  yet,  elementary  as  this  catching  and  recogni- 
zing themes  is,  it  plays  an  all-important  part  in 
our  understanding  of  a  composition ;  many  and 
many  people  listen  to  great  music, — aye,  and  enjoy 
it,  too,  after  a  fashion, — without  being  able  even 
to  say  :  "  Why,  here  is  J-0,  Joe  ! " 

The  next  mental  process  in  listening  to  music 
understandingly,  and  the  one  which  taxes  the  lis- 


MUSICIANS  AND   MUSIC-LOVERS  49 

tener's  musical  observation  the  most  severely,  is 
the  perception  of  the  relation  borne  by  one  part  of 
a  composition  to  another,  that  is,  the  perception  of 
the  organic  character  of  its  structure.  Yet  this 
process  is,  after  all,  very  like  that  by  which  we  ar- 
rive at  the  perception  of  a  simple  melody  ;  indeed 
it  is  essentially  the  same,  only,  in  applying  it,  the 
mind  works  with  larger  units.  Music  is  in  more 
than  one  respect  like  architecture  ;  some  of  the 
larger  forms  of  composition  may  be  likened  to  a 
great  street  all  planned  out  by  one  architect. 
There  is,  to  begin  with,  the  architecture  of  each 
single  house  ;  but  the  house  is  only  a  unit  in  the 
block,  and  the  harmonious  architecture  of  the  block 
itself  is  to  be  considered,  too.  Again,  the  block  is, 
in  its  turn,  but  a  unit  in  the  whole  street,  and  the 
street  can  have  its  coherent  architectural  design 
as  well  as  the  single  block  or  the  single  house.  If 
we  do  not  see  many  architecturally  planned  streets, 
we  do  have  unnumbered  organically  developed  com- 
positions, the  plan  of  which  embraces  the  harmo- 
nious relations  between  larger  and  ever  larger  units. 
And  the  organic  relation  the  practised  ear  finds  to 
exist  between  the  larger  units  in  the  scheme  of,  say, 
a  symphonic  movement,  is  not  unlike  that  which 
the  musical  intelligence  of  less  scope  detects  be- 
tween the  smaller  units  that  combine  to  constitute 
a  simple  melody.  For  instance,  that  correspon- 
4 


50  MUSICIANS   AND   MUSIC-LOVERS 

dence  in  form  which  any  one  can  notice  in  the  first 
and  last  phrases  of  almost  any  common  tune — say, 
in  Silver  threads  among  the  gold, — is  to  be  recog- 
nized, on  a  larger  scale,  in  the  great  opening  and 
concluding  sections  of  the  first  movements  of  sona- 
tas and  symphonies.  When  this  larger  organic 
structure  of  a  composition  has  been  clearly  per- 
ceived, then, — and  not  till  then, — is  the  composi- 
tion understood. 

Here  we  have  the  essential  elements  of  intelli- 
gent listening  to  music.  First  comes  the  clear 
perception  of  the  melodic  unit ;  then  the  per- 
ception of  the  organic  relation  between  larger  and 
larger  musical  units.  This  sounds  rather  dry  and 
unemotional ;  but  remember  that  it  is  the  analysis 
of  a  mental  process  which  is,  in  reality,  no  more 
complex  than  that  of  listening  understandingly  to 
the  recitation  of  a  poem,  and  not  so  complex  as 
that  of  reading  a  novel.  The  dryness  is  in  the 
analysis,  not  in  the  process  itself. 

No  doubt,  if  this  process  of  listening  to  music  is 
accompanied  by  a  conscious  mental  effort, — as  it  is 
almost  unavoidably  in  listening  to  a  complicated 
composition  for  the  first  time, — there  will  be  a 
corresponding  loss  of  purely  emotional  pleasure. 
This  is  why  people,  musicians  included,  enjoy  new 
music  less  thoroughly  than  that  with  which  they 
are  already  familiar.     But  the  process  must  be 


MUSICIANS   AND   MUSIC-LOVERS  51 

gone  through  with,  notwithstanding,  if  specifi- 
cally musical  enjoyment  is  to  be  obtained,  if  the 
pleasure  we  derive  from  music  is  to  be  more  and 
higher  than  a  merely  physical  or  vaguely  emotio- 
nal gratification.  To  be  sure,  the  process  is  an  in- 
tellectual one ;  but,  if  we  deem  the  activity  of  the 
intellect  any  bar  to  the  perfectly  free  play  of  the 
emotions,  we  must  read  the  history  of  art  back- 
ward !  It  is  not  intellectual  activity,  but  only 
conscious  intellectual  effort,  that  checks  the  throb- 
bing of  the  pulse  ;  and  it  may  truly  be  said  that 
our  highest  and  noblest  emotions,  certainly  all  such 
as  it  lies  within  the  province  of  art  to  arouse,  are 
appealed  to  through  the  intellect,  and  not  through 
the  senses  alone.  Be  it  remembered,  furthermore, 
that  what  intellectual  effort  is  at  first  required  to 
understand  music,  to  apprehend  its  form  and  or- 
ganic quality,  grows  less  and  less  with  familiarity 
and  practice,  until  at  last  it  vanishes  altogether. 
In  any  case,  if  the  music  be  really  great,  the  game 
is  worth  the  candle. 

It  is  the  want  of  appreciation,  on  the  part  of  the 
general  music-lover,  of  the  fact  that  the  intellec- 
tual effort  to  understand  the  larger  and  more  com- 
plex forms  of  music  really  does  vanish  after  a  while, 
and  leave  the  emotional  part  of  the  listener's  nature 
free  to  commune  with  what  is  emotional  in  the 
music  itself,  that  has  given  rise  to  a  very  common 


52  MUSICIANS  AND  MUSIC-LOVERS 

and,  at  the  same  time,  utterly  false  and  groundless 
fling  made  at  the  cultivated  musician  by  unthink- 
ing outsiders  :  this  is,  that  the  musician  is  capable 
only  of  a  merely  intellectual  enjoyment  of  music. 
Because  the  musician  lives  in  a  world  of  tones  of 
which  none  but  him  has  an  approximately  correct 
idea,  and  in  which  the  uncultured  music-lover  can 
not  at  once  discover  the  musical  alcohol  and  mor- 
phine after  which  his  soul  thirsteth ;  because  the 
musician  declares  that  this  alcohol  and  morphine 
are  not  the  properest  food  for  an  aesthetic  soul : 
he  must  forthwith  undergo  a  contemptuous  dia- 
gnosis, the  upshot  of  which  is  that  he  is  pro- 
nounced to  be  wanting  in  heart  and  all  the  nobler 
sensibilities  and  to  cling  to  music  by  his  intellect 
alone.  No  amount  of  argument  will  drive  this  idea 
out  of  people's  heads  when  it  has  once  taken  root 
there  ;  all  reasoning  falls  from  their  understanding 
like  water  off  a  duck's  back.  Let  it  only  be  said 
here  most  distinctly  that,  of  all  the  wrong  notions 
that  have  ever  bemuddled  the  human  mind,  this  is 
the  most  utterly  idiotic. 

People  in  general  listen  to  great  music,  as  it 
were,  in  a  dream ;  only  the  musician  is  fully  awake 
and  in  sure  possession  of  his  faculties.  He  is  not 
wafted  helplessly  hither  and  thither  on  a  vaguely 
surging  sea  of  sound,  an  unresisting  prey  to  the 
composer's  every  whim.     Music  is  his  proper  ele- 


MUSICIANS   AND  MUSIC-LO\kERS  53 

ment.  As  we  see  the  torpid  snails  and  barnacles 
in  a  rocky  pool  by  the  sea-side  suddenly  start  into 
consciousness  and  activity  as  the  first  cool,  oxygen- 
charged  wave  of  the  returning  tide  washes  over 
them,  so  does  the  musician  find  in  music  the  life- 
giving  draught  that  arouses  all  his  nobler  faculties 
to  action.  He  is,  in  very  truth,  the  only  real  music- 
lover ;   others  are  but  music  -  likers.     They  like 

music, 

.     .     .     .     M  but  much  as  we 

Down  at  the  bath-house  love  the  sea, 

Who  breathe  its  salt  and  bruise  its  sands. 

While     ....     do  but  follow  the  fishing  gull 

That  flaps  and  floats  from  wave  to  cave  ! 

There's  the  sea-lover,  fair  my  friend !  " 

Music  is  not  an  alcohol  to  intoxicate  the  musi- 
cian, an  anodyne  to  bring  mere  momentary  f orget- 
f  ulness  of  the  day's  cares  and  troubles,  nor  a  sense- 
killing  potion  to  waft  him  lazily  into  luxurious 
hasheesh-dreams  of  a  Mahomet's  Paradise  ;  it  brings 
with  it  the  wholesome  oxygen  necessary  to  his 
complete  vitality.  So  soon  as  he  is  in  the  presence 
of  a  mighty  composition,  he  plunges  into  the 
music,  heart  and  soul,  and  his  whole  being  is 
aroused  to  vigourous  action.    As  Ambros  has  said  : 

M  The  enjoyment  of  a  work  of  art  is  by  no  means  a  passive 
state  ;  a  correct  understanding,  and  with  it  the  highest  en- 
joyment, consist  in  our  re-creating  for  ourselves,  as  it 
were,  that  which  is  offered  us  by  the  composer." 


JOHANN  SEBASTIAN  BACH 


JOHANN  SEBASTIAN  BACH 

There  are  two  kinds  of  men  of  creative  genius  : 
those  whose  works  appeal  to  the  many,  and  those 
whose  message  is  understood  and  valued  only  by 
the  few.  In  these  days,  when  the  niceties  of  culture 
are  highly  prized,  we  are  perhaps  a  little  prone  to 
over-value  exclusiveness,  to  deem  the  admiration 
of  the  vulgar  a  thing  of  small  account.  That  a 
great  writer  should  be  incomprehensible  to  the 
many  seems  no  shame,  and  some  of  us  are  not  un- 
willing to  go  a  step  farther,  and  take  obscurity  to 
be  a  prima  facie  evidence  of  profundity  ;  as  Zola, 
in  his  grim,  sarcastic  way,  once  said  of  a  certain 
tragedy  :  u  The  play  was  incomprehensible  to  such 
a  degree  that  it  seemed  as  if  it  must  conceal  some 
superior  truth. n  Yet,  if  art  is  but  another  name 
for  expression,  perfect  clarity  and  distinctness  are 
among  its  most  important  elements  ;  the  poet  who, 
like  Shakspere,  can  give  so  sharp  a  point  to  a 
thought  that  it  can  pierce  through  the  tough  shell 
of  unculture  and  penetrate  the  understanding  of 
the  boor,  would  seem  to  be  greater,  to  be  possessed 


58  JOHANN   SEBASTIAN  BACH 

of  more  intrinsic  artistic  force,  than  he  who,  like 
Dante,  is  comprehended  only  by  the  student.  The 
keen  rays  of  Shakspere's  genius  kindle  a  fire  in  the 
breast  of  the  unlettered  mechanic  as  well  as  of  the 
philosopher ;  the  little  bootblack  in  the  gallery 
follows  Hamlet  as  eagerly  as  the  professor  in  the 
stalls,  and,  although  some  points  doubtless  escape 
him,  he  is  all  aglow  with  interest,  and  at  least 
thinks  he  understands.  But  how  many  of  us 
think  we  understand  Dante  ?  To  students  he  is 
the  light  of  lights,  but  most  of  us  catch  the  rays 
of  that  sun  only  as  they  are  reflected  by  other 
minds.  Dante  is  below  the  narrow  intellectual 
horizon  of  the  many  ;  to  bring  him  within  the 
range  of  our  mental  telescope,  we  must  first  climb 
to  some  eminence,  and  view  him  from  there. 
Shakspere's  rays  dart  down  to  the  depths  of  every 
valley ;  for  Dante  to  shine  upon  you,  you  must 
stand  on  the  mountain-tops.  And  yet  it  were, 
upon  the  whole,  quite  as  foolish  to  award  the  palm 
of  superior  greatness  to  Shakspere  for  his  univer- 
sality as  to  give  it  to  Dante  for  his  exclusiveness. 
One  poet  comes  to  us,  as  Oarlyle  said  of  Emerson, 
"  with  news  from  the  Empyrean  ; "  another  brings 
tidings  from  the  world  around  us  ;  a  third  reports 
of  what  he  has  seen  in  the  nether  depths.  The 
number  of  ears  that  are  a-prick  to  listen  to  the 
brought  by  any  one  of  them  will  depend 


JOHANN   SEBASTIAN  BACH  59 

not  only  upon  the  clearness  of  his  statement,  but 
also  upon  the  very  nature  of  the  message  itself. 
The  genius  who  holds  the  whole  world  at  his  feet 
through  centuries  is  not  de  facto  either  greater  or 
less  than  the  genius  who  compels  only  the  homage 
of  the  elect.  Art  is  expression,  and  the  perfection 
of  expression  is  that  which  is  best  adapted  to  con- 
vey the  idea  to  be  expressed ;  but  the  most  perfect 
expression  in  the  world  will  not  convey  an  idea  to 
a  mind  that  is  incapable  of  receiving  it.  Shak- 
spere's  popularity,  to  use  a  common  phrase,  is  more 
extended  than  Dante's,  not  because  he  was  pos- 
sessed of  a  more  highly  potentized  poetic  power, 
but  because  he  worked  in  a  more  familiar  field. 

I  have  chosen  Shakspere  and  Dante  as  examples 
of  two  kinds  of  creative  genius  because  they  are 
not  only  familiar  names,  but  their  true  status  as 
men  of  genius,  even  the  dominant  cast  of  the 
genius  of  each,  is  pretty  generally  known.  Also 
because  one  of  them  presents,  in  the  character 
of  his  works  and  in  the  influence  he  has  exerted 
upon  succeeding  generations  down  to  the  present 
day,  many  points  of  analogy  with  the  great  man  of 
whom  I  have  especially  to  speak  here. 

It  were  hard  to  say  which  of  the  great  composers 
holds  the  place  in  the  history  of  music  that  Shak- 
spere does  in  the  annals  of  poetry.  But  the  Dante 
of  music  is  unquestionably  Johann  Sebastian  Bach. 


60  JOHANN  SEBASTIAN  BACH 

I  know  that  all  analogies  limp  somewhat ;  but  this 
one  can  fairly  be  said  to  keep  its  balance. 

Bach's  works,  both  during  his  own  lifetime  and 
since  his  death,  have,  as  a  rule,  appealed  only  to 
the  especially  cultured  few.  There  is  hardly 
another  great  composer  who  has  had  so  small  a 
public  as  he.  And  yet  no  composer  that  ever 
lived  is  held  in  profounder  and  more  loving  reve- 
rence by  those  that  do  know  him.  It  may  be  said 
of  Bach,  as  Lowell  said  of  Dante,  that  "  his  read- 
ers turn  students,  his  students  zealots,  and  what 
was  a  taste  becomes  a  religion. n  The  wild  enthu- 
siasm with  which  Wagnerians  burn  for  the  Bay- 
reuth  master  seems  poor  and  pyrotechnic  when 
compared  with  the  quieter  adoration  of  the  Bach 
lover.  No  one  man  has  left  so  deep  a  mark  on 
the  history  of  music,  nor  has  exerted  so  strong  and 
far-reaching  an  influence  upon  the  subsequent  de- 
velopment of  the  art  as  he.  If  the  great  com- 
posers from  Gluck  to  Beethoven  studied  him  com- 
paratively little,  his  works  being  for  the  most 
part  unpublished  and  hard  to  obtain  in  their  day, 
there  have  been  few  notable  musicians  since  Beet- 
hoven who  have  not  made  his  works  the  object 
of  reverent  study.  The  most  dissimilar  musical 
minds  have  found  delight  in  him.  To  Mendels- 
sohn and  Schumann  he  was  as  their  daily  bread  ; 
the  open  volumes  of  his  works  cover  the  piano- 


JOHANN   SEBASTIAN   BACH  61 

forte  in  Verdi's  study ;  even  Bossini  conld  not 
withhold  his  tribute  of  admiration.  So  irresistible 
is  the  spell  he  casts  over  those  who  come  within 
the  range  of  his  influence,  that  once  you  have 
crossed  the  threshold  of  his  temple  you  are  his, 
heart  and  soul,  forever.  The  love  of  Bach  is  the 
most  enduring  of  musical  passions;  I  know  that 
I  can  hardly  open  a  volume  of  Bach  without  a 
certain  feeling  of  superstitious  terror ;  I  feel  as  if 
the  perusal  of  each  page  would  be  but  a  nail  in 
the  coffin  of  all  my  other  loves.  No  matter  what 
your  enthusiasm  for  other  composers  may  be, 
there  comes  a  time  when  long  communion  with 
any  one  of  them  breeds  satiety,  and  you  cry  for 
change ;  but  you  can  return  to  Bach  every  day, 
and  each  time  you  find  him  greater,  more  won- 
derful, more  all-powerful  than  before.  And  yet, 
from  his  time  down  to  the  present  day,  there  has 
been  no  composer  of  distinction  whose  works  are 
such  a  sealed  book  to  the  musical  world  at  large, 
who  is  so  little  known  save  to  the  few.  His  lo- 
vers are  worshippers,  and  call  him  greatest ;  but 
the  great  mass  of  musical  people  love  him  not. 
He  is,  as  the  phrase  goes,  the  most  unpopular  of 
great  composers.  And  mark  the  peculiarity  of 
his  case ;  for  in  this  respect  he  is  unique.  He  is 
not  a  man  whose  popularity  is  extinct,  a  thing 
of  the  past ;  unlike  many  great  men  whom  time 


62  JOHANN  SEBASTIAN  BACH 

and  the  changes  of  fashion  have  gradually  ousted 
from  a  brilliant  position  before  the  world,  Bach 
never  enjoyed  any  marked  popularity.  Even  old 
Palestrina  and  Gabrieli,  dead  as  they  are  now  to 
the  public,  were  popular  once ;  time  was  when 
all  Venice  and  Eome  rang  with  their  praises,  when 
eager  crowds  elbowed  their  way  into  St.  Peter's  or 
St.  Mark's  to  hear  a  new  work  of  theirs.  But 
with  Bach  it  is  different;  what  slight  popular 
recognition  his  works  have  had  has  pretty  steadily 
grown  rather  than  waned.  Yet  his  position  has 
always  been  a  rather  solitary  one ;  all  save  a  few  of 
his  works  are  still  incomprehensible  to  nine  out  of 
ten  of  the  musical  public ;  indeed,  he  stands  so  far 
aloof  from  popular  appreciation  that  any  expreg- 
sion  of  warm  admiration  is  pretty  sure  to  be 
greeted  with  a  smile  of  incredulity.  Here  in 
America  to-day,  you  can  hardly  show  enthusiasm 
for  Bach,  except  in  certain  circles,  without  being 
accused  of  canting.  I  have  even  heard  some  peo- 
ple give  elaborate  reasons,  not  why  they  them- 
selves took  no  pleasure  in  Bach's  music,  but  to 
prove  by  argument  that  it  was  morally  impossible 
that  any  one  should  find  delight  therein.  No 
doubt  some  of  the  more  ardent  Bach- worshippers 
have  at  times  given  a  colour  of  plausibility  to  the 
notion  that  the  Bach-cult  was  not  unmixed  with 
cant ;  for,  with  the  exception  of  Wagner,  there  is 


JOHANN   SEBASTIAN  BACH  63 

hardly  another  composer  whose  admirers  seem  at 
moments  to  fall  so  nearly  into  the  frame  of  mind 
of  the  French  critic  who  wrote  of  Victor  Hugo  : 
"Every  one  has  his  own  way.  As  for  me,  who 
speak  here,  I  admire  everything;  like  a  brute." 
No  donbt  the  Bach-cnlt  one  finds  in  some  quar- 
ters is  not  wholly  free  from  cant ;  I  never  knew 
any  cult  that  was.  But  I  must  say  that  I  have 
found  less  sham  love  for  Bach  in  people  I  have  met 
than  I  have  for  most  of  the  other  great  composers. 
On  the  contrary,  I  have  usually  found  Bach  made 
the  theme  of  the  most  up-and-down  plain  speaking. 
It  is  but  another  proof  of  the  immense  distance 
which  separates  him  from  the  popular  modes  of 
musical  thought.  Many  people  who  have  to  keep 
up  a  reputation  for  musical  taste  will  bear  the  in- 
fliction of  a  Schumann  quartet  or  a  Brahms  sym- 
phony quite  smilingly  ;  they  will  grin  and  bear  it, 
and  try  to  think  they  like  it.  But  Bach  marks  the 
point  where  the  worm  will  turn ;  he  is  the  last 
straw  that  breaks  the  back  of  musical  endurance, 
and  people  admit  quite  frankly  that  they  find  him 
intolerable.  No  doubt  there  must  be  something  in 
the  works  of  so  many-sided  a  man  as  Bach  which 
can  reach  the  popular  heart.  The  St.  Matthew- 
Passion  draws  and  holds  large  audiences  both  in 
England  and  America.  But  it  seems  to  me  that 
the  growing  popularity  of  the  Passion-Music  must 


64  JOHANN   SEBASTIAN  BACH 

rest  on  pretty  much  the  same  causes  as  that  of 
Handel's  Messiah;  and  if  the  Passion  continues  to 
keep  its  hold  on  the  public,  it  will  probably  be  by 
much  the  same  means.  There  can  be  little  doubt 
that  our  love  and  reverence  for  the  Messiah  had,  at 
first,  more  of  a  religious  than  of  a  purely  musical 
foundation  ;  and,  taken  as  a  whole,  it  is  probably 
the  text  rather  than  the  music  of  the  Passion  which 
appeals  most  strongly  to  the  popular  heart.  Musi- 
cally considered,  the  Passion  presents  no  especial 
characteristics  in  virtue  of  which  it  should  appeal 
to  the  public  more  forcibly  than  any  other  of 
Bach's  choral  compositions. 

One  seldom  hears  Bach's  name  mentioned  now- 
adays uncoupled  with  that  of  Handel.  It  is,  in- 
deed, difficult  to  speak  long  of  one  of  these  two 
giants  without  mentioning  the  other.  They  had 
much  in  common  ;  between  them  they  may  fairly 
be  said  to  have  exhausted  the  musical  field  of  their 
time.  It  is  idle  now  to  speculate  as  to  which  was 
the  greater  of  the  two  ;  much  as  they  had  in  com- 
mon, they  were  more  alike  in  their  greatness  than 
in  their  lives,  their  fortunes,  the  specific  character 
of  their  genius,  or  the  influence  they  exerted  upon 
the  subsequent  growth  of  their  art.  Handel  passed 
the  better  part  of  his  life  face  to  face  with  one  of 
the  most  brilliant  publics  in  Europe,  in  energetic 
competition  with  men  who,  if  not  quite  of  his 


JOHANN  SEBASTIAN  BACH  65 

stature,  were  still  no  pigmies.  His  rivals  are  for- 
gotten now,  save  by  name,  but  they  were  no  weak- 
lings. They  dealt  him  many  a  hard  blow  in  the 
fight  for  fame,  and  it  took  all  his  strength  to  over- 
come them  ;  no  less  imposing  a  figure  than  his  could 
have  blocked  the  path  to  immortality  for  such  men. 
They  are  forgotten,  not  because  they  were  small, 
but  because  they  were  less  than  he.  He  saw  one 
after  another  of  his  works  performed  by  the  most 
brilliant  executive  talent  of  his  day.  He  had  at 
command  the  fullest  and  best-drilled  choruses 
and  orchestras,  and  there  is  hardly  an  air  of  his 
that  is  not  associated  with  the  name  of  some  great 
and  world-famous  singer.  In  a  word,  he  lived  in 
the  very  midst  of  the  most  ardent  and  active  mu- 
sical life  of  all  Europe.  Bach  lived  quietly  in  the 
retirement  of  small  German  towns ;  Leipzig  was 
the  largest  field  he  ever  had  for  the  immediate  dis- 
play of  his  powers.  While  Handel  was  hurrying 
from  London  to  Dublin,  and  from  Dublin  to  Ox- 
ford, to  bring  out  some  great  oratorio  in  the  most 
brilliant  fashion,  Bach  wrote  for  his  little  church 
choir.  A  cantata  was  written  for  one  Sunday's 
service,  was  sung  to  the  ordinary  congregation,  and 
then  laid  aside,  only  to  be  followed  by  a  fresh  can- 
tata next  Sunday.  As  for  the  style  in  which  his 
compositions  were  given,  it  may  be  estimated  that 
he  probably  never  heard  a  very  good  performance 
6 


66  JOHANN  SEBASTIAN  BACH 

of  any  of  his  choral  works.  He  had  no  great  sing- 
ers to  deal  with,  and  heaven  knows  he  needed  them 
if  ever  a  composer  did ;  his  choir  was  small,  and 
his  orchestra,  as  a  rule,  miserably  inadequate.  He 
complained  bitterly  of  it ;  but  his  complaints  and 
expostulations  came  to  nothing.  Think  of  the 
masses  of  voices  and  instruments  that  Handel  com- 
manded, and  then  reflect  upon  the  fact  that  no 
duplicate  chorus-parts  to  a  Bach  cantata  have  ever 
been  discovered.  Bach's  choir  could  not  have 
numbered  more  than  twelve  or  sixteen  voices,  for 
it  is  hardly  possible  for  more  than  three  or  four 
singers  to  read  at  once  from  the  same  sheet.  His 
solo-singers  sang  also  in  the  choruses.  He  tra- 
velled little,  and  this,  more  than  anything  else,  set 
an  inexorable  limit  to  the  field  of  his  public  musical 
activity ;  for  in  his  day,  when  all  great  composers 
were  also  great  performers,  and  most  great  per- 
formers were  at  least  respectable  composers,  no 
musician  of  note  had  much  to  do  with  any  compo- 
sitions save  his  own  ;  it  was  only  singers,  as  a  rule, 
that  performed  other  people's  music.  When  a 
composer  wished  to  have  one  of  his  works  given, 
he  brought  it  out  himself.  See  how  different 
those  times  were  from  ours.  In  Bach  and  Han- 
del's day,  if  a  composer  lived  in  Leipzig,  he  was 
only  heard  in  Leipzig ;  if  he  wished  a  work  of  his 
to  make  the  round  of  Europe,  he  had  to  carry  it 


JOHANN   SEBASTIAN  BACH  67 

with  him  in  his  trunk,  for  no  one  else  would  take 
it  for  him.  Now  a  symphony  by  Brahms  may  be 
performed  on  the  same  evening  in  St.  Petersburg, 
Berlin,  London,  Boston,  and  New  York,  and 
Brahms  himself  be  quietly  smoking  his  cigar  the 
while  in  Vienna,  and,  likely  as  not,  know  nothing 
about  it.  Then  a  composer  had  to  paddle  his  own 
canoe,  and,  if  he  stayed  in  his  own  mill-pond,  so 
much  the  worse  for  his  fame. 

Unlike  as  were  the  lives  of  Bach  and  Handel, 
their  fortunes  were  no  less  dissimilar.  Handel's 
popularity  was  almost  as  extended  as  his  reputation 
was  great.  Bach,  on  the  other  hand,  had,  properly 
speaking,  no  popularity  even  in  his  own  town. 
The  congregations  in  Cothen  and  Leipzig  often 
complained  of  his  organ  fantasias  and  fugues  and 
kicked  against  his  cantatas,  very  much  as  the  con- 
gregation of  any  Boston  church  you  please  might 
do  to-day.  He  stood  head  and  shoulders  above  all 
his  immediate  surroundings,  and  wrote  constantly 
over  the  heads  of  his  public.  Then,  as  now,  he 
was  appreciated  only  by  connoisseurs,  by  the  elite 
of  the  musical  world.  True,  his  reputation  was 
immense ;  his  name  was  known  pretty  much  all 
over  Europe ;  but  it  was  for  the  most  part  merely  a 
reputation  by  hearsay.  Even  during  his  lifetime  it 
was  his  luck  to  be  one  of  those  men  whose  greatness 
most  people  are  content  to  take  for  granted ;   and 


68  JOHANN   SEBASTIAN   BACH 

in  this  respect  his  reputation  has  not  changed  much 
since. 

In  the  matter  of  style  Bach  and  Handel  had  this 
in  common,  that  they  both  wrote  in  the  prevalent 
musical  style  of  their  day.  But,  admitting  that  the 
two  men  stood  nearly  on  the  same  level  in  point  of 
intrinsic  genius,  Bach  was  decidedly  the  more  ver- 
satile of  the  two.  His  habitual  style  was  at  once 
more  complex  and  more  daring ;  it  was  what  the 
French  call  more  personal,  Handel,  especially  in 
his  later  works,  often  shows  himself  as  something 
of  a  mannerist ;  with  all  his  genius  he  was  liable  to 
fall  into  certain  set  traditional  grooves.  Even  an 
expert  might  easily  take  an  air  by  Buononcini, 
Ariosti,  or  Alessandro  Scarlatti  to  have  been  writ- 
ten by  Handel.  But  almost  everything  by  Bach  is 
ear-marked ;  once  know  his  style  and  you  will 
hardly  mistake  it.  You  often  recognize  Handel 
only  by  the  force  of  the  blow  he  strikes ;  you  de- 
tect Bach  by  the  way  in  which  the  stroke  is  deli- 
vered. As  Bach's  style  is  more  complex  than  Han- 
del's, so  is  it  also  more  subtile  and  elastic ;  with 
all  its  grandeur  it  is  full  of  finesse. .  You  find  him 
always  fully  penetrated  by  the  special  character  of 
his  subject ;  everything  he  wrote  seems  to  have  been 
written  with  perfect  distinctness  of  artistic  intent, 
and  he  seldom,  if  ever,  lapses  into  mere  mannerism. 
He  says  just  the  right  word  for  the  occasion ;  with 


JOHANN  SEBASTIAN  BACH  b« 

the  possible  exception  of  Beethoven,  no  composer 
that  ever  lived  was  so  little  of  a  mannerist.  You 
feel  Bach's  ever- vigilant  will  behind  every  note  ; 
his  music  never  sounds  as  if  it  had  written  itself. 
No  man,  even  among  our  modern  romanticists  and 
tone-painters,  ever  put  a  greater  wealth  of  meaning 
into  a  phrase  than  Bach  did. 

But  where  Bach  differs  most  from  Handel  is  in 
the  influence  he  exerted  upon  the  subsequent  de- 
velopment of  the  art  of  music.  Handel's  influence 
seems,  upon  the  whole,  to  have  been  slight,  and 
confined  for  the  most  part  to  England.  His  splen- 
did development  of  the  oratorio  fired  later  com- 
posers to  emulation  in  this  particular  form  of  com- 
position ;  but  his  influence  seems  to  have  been  more 
of  a  moral  than  of  a  material  nature.  His  great- 
ness and  glory  were  an  ever-living  inspiration  to  the 
composers  who  came  after  him,  but  I  doubt  if  any 
point  in  the  technics  of  modern  composition  or  of 
modern  performance  can  rightly  trace  its  pedigree 
back  to  him.  I  know  that  a  good  deal  of  the 
music  written  since  his  day  has,  now  and  then,  a 
so-called  Handelian  flavour.  But  except  in  cases 
where  a  direct  imitation  was  attempted,  as  in  Beet- 
hoven's Weihe  des  Hauses  overture  and  Mosche- 
les's  Hommage  a  Hcendel,  this  influence  can  hardly 
be  traced  directly  to  Handel.  What  we  loosely 
term  Handelian  in  this  or  that  composition  is,  in 


70  JOHANN  SEBASTIAN  BACH 

nine  cases  ont  of  ten,  a  reflection  not  so  nmch  of 
Handel's  individual  style  as  of  the  style  of  the 
whole  Neapolitan  school  of  Alessandro  Scarlatti  and 
the  first  generation  or  two  of  his  followers.  Were 
Handel  the  subject  of  the  present  article  it  would 
be  interesting  to  follow  out  in  detail  the  many  and 
close  relations  which  existed  between  him  and  this 
school ;  but  this  would  be  apart  from  my  purpose 
in  this  essay.  In  Bach,  however,  we  find  the  germ, 
the  potency  and  power  of  almost  everything  great 
that  has  been  done  in  music  since  his  day ;  his  in- 
fluence is  everywhere  felt,  and  this  is  the  reason 
why  I  have  chosen  to  speak  especially  of  him  in- 
stead of  Handel.  No  doubt  Bach's  influence  was 
not  exerted  so  directly  upon  the  great  Austrian 
school  of  composers  who  came  a  generation  or  two 
after  him — upon  Haydn,  Mozart,  and  Beethoven — 
as  it  was  indirectly  through  the  medium  of  his  son, 
Philipp  Emanuel.  I  have  already  hinted  that  only 
a  few  of  Bach's  works  were  easily  attainable  at  that 
time.  The  Well-tempered  Clavichord,  the  Art  of 
Fugue,  and  some  organ  works  were  well  enough 
known  and  diligently  studied,  but  it  was  hardly 
until  Mendelssohn's  day  that  the  world  had  an 
opportunity  of  investigating  the  richest  treasures 
in  Bach's  legacy,  his  choral  works.  Yet  Bach's 
influence  upon  the  Austrian  school — upon  Haydn, 
Mozart,  and  Beethoven — working,  though  it  did, 


JOHANN  SEBASTIAN  BACH  71 

partly  at  second-hand  through  Philipp  Emannel 
Bach,  was  immensely  strong.  In  Beethoven,  who 
had  somewhat  larger  opportunity  of  studying  Bach 
himself  than  fell  to  the  lot  of  Haydn  or  Mozart — 
in  Beethoven,  and  most  especially  in  the  works  of 
his  last  manner,  the  traces  of  Bach's  influence  meet 
the  eye  at  almost  every  turning.  Indeed,  Beethoven 
may  be  said  to  have  been  the  first  great  composer 
who,  in  his  study  of  Bach,  penetrated  very  far 
through  the  outer  shell  of  his  works  and  assimilated 
something  of  deeper  import  than  their  technical 
side.  The  Bach  influence  may  be  said  to  have  cul- 
minated in  Mendelssohn  and  Schumann  ;  he  was, 
in  fact,  Mendelssohn's  corner-stone,  and  without 
him  Schumann  would  have  been  impossible.  Nor 
was  Bach's  influence  confined  to  the  art  of  compo- 
sition ;  our  whole  modern  school  of  pianoforte 
playing  derives,  in  the  end,  from  him.  In  a  word, 
Sebastian  Bach  is  the  great  source  and  fountain- 
head  from  whence  well-nigh  all  that  is  best  and 
most  enduring  in  modern  music  has  been  derived. 
In  him  we  find  an  influence  so  strong,  so  subtile, 
so  far-reaching  and  pervasive,  that  that  exerted  by 
any  other  single  composer  is  hardly  to  be  compared 
with  it.  In  him  we  find  united  all  the  requisite 
conditions  for  the  exertion  of  such  an  influence. 
First,  as  great  specific  genius  as  was  ever  possessed 
by  man,  coupled  with  the  most  complete  mastery 


72  JOHANN  SEBASTIAN  BACH 

over  the  technics  of  his  art  that  has  ever  been 
known.  Next,  a  strongly  characterized  individua- 
lity. Then,  that  foreseeing  spirit  which  anticipates 
new  aesthetic  points  of  view  ;  and,  lastly,  the  oppor- 
tunity, the  lucky  chance  of  coming  into  the  world 
just  at  the  right  time  to  find  the  exact  task  await- 
ing him  which  he  was  best  fitted  to  accomplish. 

It  is  not  unnatural  that,  of  all  the  various  ele- 
ments of  Bach's  prowess  as  a  composer,  his  purely 
technical  mastery  should  be  the  one  which  has  met 
with  the  most  universal  recognition.  Even  those 
profane  unbelievers  who  deny  him  all  else,  are  wil- 
ling to  admit  the  vast  extent  and  thoroughness  of 
his  musical  learning.  So  immense,  indeed,  was 
Bach's  command  of  musical  technics,  that  this 
very  power  of  his  has  often  been  cast  in  his  teeth  as 
an  imputation  upon  his  genius.  When  a  man  is  so 
very  learned,  people  have  said,  he  can  not  be  much 
else.  This  matter  of  purely  technical  mastery  has 
always  been  a  stumbling-block  to  some  short-sighted 
minds ;  it  is  the  one  question  in  art  which  is  most 
seldom  viewed  in  its  true  light.  Because  it  is  neces- 
sary for  a  workman  to  be  able  to  handle  the  tools 
of  his  trade  deftly  in  the  mechanical  arts,  some  peo- 
ple seem  to  think  that  technical  skill,  even  when 
applied  to  the  fine  arts,  is  something  absolutely 
mechanical  in  itself.  That  it  has  its  mechanical 
side,  that  a  great  deal  of  purely  mechanical  prac- 


JOHANN   SEBASTIAN   BACH  73 

tice  is  needed  to  acquire  it,  is  unquestionable. 
Technical  skill  is,  in  the  end,  nothing  more  than  a 
complete  command  over  the  muscular  and  mental 
faculties  necessary  for  the  performance  of  this  or 
that  task.  If  the  task  is  mechanical,  the  skill  will 
be  mechanical  too ;  but  if,  on  the  other  hand,  the 
task  is  more  than  mechanical,  then  will  the  skill 
also  need  to  be  as  much  more  than  mechanical  as 
the  task  is.  I  know  that  there  is  a  too  prevalent 
notion  that  many  of  the  musical  tasks  Bach  habi- 
tually imposed  upon  himself,  in  other  words,  that 
the  musical  forms  in  which  he  was  fond  of  writing 
really  were  purely  mechanical,  or,  as  the  popular 
phrase  goes,  purely  mathematical.  But  just  here 
is  the  great  mistake.  No  musical  form  is,  ever 
was,  nor  ever  can  be  purely  mathematical.  Musical 
forms,  like  visual  forms,  may  be  mathematically 
computed  and  mathematically  expressed  in  terms 
of  a  plus  b,  and  x  and  y  and  so  on.  I  have  been 
given  to  understand  that  mathematicians  will  for- 
mulate for  you  the  algebraic  expression  of  the 
curve  of  a  sea-gull's  wing,  or  the  line  of  beauty 
that  runs  from  arm-pit  to  ankle  in  the  female  fi- 
gure. I  have  little  doubt  that  some  ingenious 
mathematician  will,  in  time,  succeed  in  construct- 
ing an  algebraic  formula  capable  of  being  deve- 
loped into  the  perfectly  correct  exposition  of  a  four- 
part  tonal  fugue.     But  in  art  the  question  is  not 


74  JOHANN  SEBASTIAN  BACH 

whether  visual  or  musical  forms  are  mathematically 
computable,  or  even  mathematically  producible. 
The  question  is  how  they  actually  are  produced, 
for  what  purpose,  and  in  what  spirit.  Did  the 
artist  produce  the  visual  or  musical  form  simply 
for  its  own  sake,  and  to  show  that  he  could  do  it ; 
or  did  he  go  to  work  like  Goethe's  World-Spirit, 
who  "sits  at  the  whirring  loom  of  Time,  and 
weaves  the  living  garment  of  the  Godhead  "■  ? 
That  is  the  question,  and  the  whole  question. 
Some  musical  forms  are  more  complex  than  others, 
more  hedged  in  with  restrictions  and  conditions  ; 
the  more  complex  they  are,  and  the  more  encum- 
bered with  specific  conditions,  the  more  difficult 
they  are  to  work  in.  I  admit  this  freely.  There 
are  even  some  forms  of  counterpoint  so  compli- 
cated, so  burdened  with  trying  conditions,  that  no 
man  has  yet  acquired  the  requisite  technical  skill 
to  handle  them  freely  and  easily.  But  there  are 
other  musical  forms  which,  although  extremely 
complex  and  difficult  to  handle  with  freedom, 
have  been  thoroughly  mastered.  The  fugue  is 
one  of  these.  I  have  heard  many  people  com- 
plain that  fugues  are  dry ;  you  might  say,  with 
equal  reason,  that  demijohns  are  dry — some  are 
and  some  are  not — it  all  depends  upon  what  is  in 
them.  The  fugue  is  an  exceedingly  complex  musical 
form ;  it  takes  Fetis  several  folio  pages  to  set  forth 


JOHANN   SEBASTIAN  BACH  75 

the  rules  for  writing  a  fugue ;  these  rules  seem  near- 
ly endless,  and  every  paragraph  like  Browning's. 

"     .     .     .     .     great  text  in  Galatians, 
Once  you  trip  on  it,  entails 
Twenty-nine  distinct  damnations, 
One  sure,  if  another  fails." 

In  truth,  a  fugue  is  no  child's  play ;  to  write  a 
good  one  is  not  an  easy  matter.  Neither  is  dancing 
on  the  tight-rope  ;  you  or  I  would  cut  but  a  sorry 
figure  there,  even  if  we  had  the  luck  to  save  our 
necks.  But  the  skilled  tight-rope  dancer  finds  it 
easy  enough ;  nay,  more  :  the  very  rope,  which 
makes  the  whole  difficulty  in  the  matter  to  you  or 
me,  is  to  him  the  chief  source  of  power.  Its  elas- 
ticity enables  him  to  bound  into  the  air  with  a 
lightness  and  vigour  such  as  no  Taglioni  could 
hope  to  emulate.  Just  so  the  fugue  form,  the 
complexities  and  strict  requirements  of  which  are 
so  harassing  to  the  tyro,  becomes  in  its  very  self 
a  source  of  strength  to  the  composer  who  has 
thoroughly  mastered  it.  And  no  man  was  ever  a 
more  complete  master  of  the  fugue,  and  of  the 
other  cognate  forms  of  polyphonic  composition, 
than  Bach.  That  whole  style  of  writing,  of  which 
the  fugue  is  but  one,  if  the  highest,  expression, 
was  a  second  musical  nature  to  Bach  ;  not  only  he 
wrote  in  it,  but  he  thought  in  it,  he  dreamt  in  it. 


76  JOHAKN   SEBASTIAN   BACH 

It  was  as  easy  and  natural  for  him  to  clothe  his  in- 
spiration in  a  polyphonic  or  quasi-fugal  form,  as 
it  was  for  him  to  speak  German.  It  is,  to  our  mo- 
dern apprehension,  a  somewhat  ponderous  musical 
mechanism.  I  remember  when  the  Harvard  men 
went  to  London,  in  the  summer  of  1869,  to  row 
against  Oxford,  how  a  young  English  oarsman, 
after  examining  the  American  boat  and  its  equip- 
ments with  much  curiosity,  asked  Harry  Kelly  if 
he  did  not  think  the  oars  too  large  and  heavy  ? 
"The  oars  are  none  too  large,"  answered  Kelly, 
"if  the  men  can  really  pull  them  through  the 
water."  Bach  could  really  pull  the  fugue  form 
through  the  water ;  where  it  was  too  ponderous  for 
others  to  swing  without  some  exertion,  he  could 
juggle  with  it.  He  did  not  have  to  follow  rules  ; 
he  felt  and  knew  that  all  scholastic  rules,  even  those 
which  apply  to  the  fugue  and  its  cognate  forms, 
were  but  more  or  less  imperfect  attempts  at  for- 
mulating eternal  musical  laws.  And  these  laws  had 
become  such  a  part  and  parcel  of  his  whole  musi- 
cal nature,  that  he  followed  them  out  instinctively, 
regardless  of  formulas.  If  a  scholastic  rule  stood 
in  his  way,  so  much  the  worse  for  the  rule.  He 
knew  as  much  more  about  a  fugue  or  a  canon 
than  the  scholastic  rule-makers  did,  as  Nature 
knows  more  about  a  tree  than  the  botanists  do. 
Eduard  Hanslick,  of  Vienna,  writing  of  the  two 


JOHANN   SEBASTIAN   BACH  77 

fugued  choruses,  the  "  Sanctus  "  and  the  "  Libera 
me"  in  Verdi's  Manzoni  Requiem,  says  : 

• '  It  is  no  wonder  that  an  Italian  opera  composer  who,  up 
to  his  sixtieth  year,  had  not  thought  of  a  fugue,  should  feel 
some  anxiety  in  face  of  such  a  task,  and  should  turn  back 
after,  say,  every  four  measures  to  look  at  his  scheme  and  see 
•  what  comes  next.'  Most  modern  fugues  breathe  something 
of  a  similar  constraint  in  contrast  to  those  of  Bach  and  Han- 
del, which  almost  always  reveal,  even  in  the  invention  of 
their  themes,  the  freedom  of  genius,  and  in  their  working- 
out,  a  convincing  force  and  naturalness.  The  fugued  style 
was  a  thoroughly  natural  language  to  those  masters  (as  the 
most  difficult  antique  metres  were  to  many  of  the  older  poets 
and  schools  of  poetry)  ;  they  could  think  and  create  in  it 
with  sovereign  freedom.  He  who  thinks  and  invents  poly- 
phonically,  as  to  the  manner  born,  can  write  good  fugues. 
Later  the  fugue  shrivelled  up  more  and  more  to  mere  for- 
malism. .  .  .  Even  Mendelssohn,  who  handled  the  arts 
of  learned  music  with  greater  mastery,  at  all  events,  with 
more  clearness  and  charm  than  most  modern  composers, 
seems  always  to  lose  something  of  the  specific  gravity  of  his 
talent  when  he  writes  fully  developed  fugues.  Mendelssohn 
himself  said  to  Moritz  Hauptmann,  about  the  five-part  B- 
flat  major  fugue  in  St.  Paul,  '  that  he  wrote  it  because  peo- 
ple always  want  to  hear  a  regular  fugue  in  an  oratorio,  and 
think  that  the  composer  does  not  know  how,  unless  he  gives 
them  one.'  " 

I  have  spoken  of  the  fugue  at  such  length  be- 
cause it  represents,  as  a  musical  form,  the  most 
highly  organized  development   of   those  general 


78  JOHANN  SEBASTIAN  BACH 

principles  which  underlie  Bach's  habitual  style  of 
composition.  Not  that  Bach  was  more  indisso- 
lubly  wedded  to  the  fugue,  as  such,  than  his  con- 
temporaries were ;  for  regularly  constructed  and 
developed  fugues  do  not  constitute  a  large  pro- 
portion of  his  works.  In  his  choral  compositions, 
a  fague  is  rather  a  rarity;  there  is  not  a  single 
one  in  the  whole  St.  Matthew-Passion.  Still,  the 
formal  plastic  principles  on  which  by  far  the 
greater  part  of  Bach's  music  is  based,  find  their 
highest  expression  in  the  fugue,  and  in  just  so  far 
may  this  particular  form  be  taken  as  characteris- 
tic of  his  general  style.  As  I  have  said,  you  may 
not  meet  with  a  very  great  number  of  fully  orga- 
nized fugues  in  his  works,  but  you  will  find  that 
f  ugal  elements  meet  you  at  almost  every  turning. 
Before  quitting  this  matter  of  the  fugue,  let  me 
quote  a  very  instructive  remark  of  von  Billow's,  a 
remark  which  is  well  worthy  the  attention  of  those 
who  persist  in  seeing  in  the  fugue  nothing  higher 
than  an  arid  formalism.  Von  Biilow  said  to  me 
once  :  "  It  is  well  to  notice  how  Beethoven  in  his 
last  period,  whenever  he  had  lashed  himself  up  to 
such  a  white  heat  of  passion  that  he  hardly  knew 
where  to  look  for  adequate  means  of  expression, 
almost  invariably  took  to  the  fugue." 

It  is  in  the  fugue,  the  canon,  and  the  cognate 
freer  polyphonic  forms,  that  Bach's  technical  mas- 


JOHANN  SEBASTIAN  BACH  79 

tery  displays  itself  most  convincingly ;  the  very 
fact  that  he  applied  his  astounding  technique  to 
these  forms  was  one  of  the  chief  causes  of  the  in- 
fluence he  exerted  upon  the  subsequent  develop- 
ment of  his  art.  Indeed,  it  may  truly  be  said 
that  without  that  well-nigh  total  exhaustion  of  all 
the  practical  possibilities  of  musical  technics  which 
we  owe  to  Bach,  and  in  some  measure  to  Bach 
alone,  the  subsequent  developments  the  art  of 
music  has  undergone  at  the  hands  of  Haydn,  Beet- 
hoven, Schumann,  and  Wagner  would  have  been 
virtually  impossible.  It  was  Bach  who  rendered 
musical  material  so  pliable  that  it  was  like  wax 
in  the  hands  of  the  great  composers  who  came 
after  him.  And  it  would  have  been  impossible 
for  even  Bach  himself  to  achieve  this  conquest  had 
he  not  applied  his  enormous  technique  to  that 
style  of  composition  which  has  most  to  do  with 
what  may,  not  inaptly,  be  called  the  internal  struc- 
ture, the  very  anatomy  of  music. 

Bach  was,  in  one  sense,  essentially  a  classicist ; 
by  this  I  mean  that,  no  matter  what  his  regard  for 
the  expressive  or  emotional  element  in  music  may 
have  been,  he  always  aimed  at  perfect  beauty  of 
form.  Beauty  of  form  is  the  chief,  if  not  the  only 
aim  of  pure  classic  art,  and  it  is  by  their  physical 
beauty  that  the  classic  masterpieces  impress  us 
most  strongly. 


80  JOHANN   SEBASTIAN  BACH 

I  once  heard  James  Knssell  Lowell  say  that,  in 
looking  at  the  Venus  of  Milo,  he  was  perfectly 
willing  to  take  her  for  her  looks  ;  he  never  troubled 
himself  to  ask  whether  she  had  any  "views."  She 
was  perfectly  beautiful  and  perfectly  god-like,  and 
that  was  enough ! 

It  is  to  be  noted  also  that  classic  art  aims  not 
merely  at  beauty  of  outward  form,  but  in  its  best 
estate  shows  us  beauty  of  form  as  immediately 
dependent  on,  and  inseparable  from,  a  perfect 
internal  organism.  So  soon  as  classic  art  begins 
tc  forget  this  truth,  you  may  be  sure  that  an  era 
of  decadence  and  epigonic  eclecticism  has  set  in. 
I,  too,  care  nothing  for  what  u  views  n  the  Venus 
of  Milo  may  have,  or  not  have  ;  but  of  one  thing  I 
am  absolutely  certain,  she  had  a  faultless  diges- 
tion. Gibson's  nymphs,  on  the  other  hand,  beau- 
tiful as  they  are  in  face  and  figure,  look  as  if  it 
were  not  impossible  for  them  to  have  a  sick  head- 
ache. There  is  much  beauty  of  form  there,  but  it 
is  not  the  beauty  that  comes  from  a  perfect  orga- 
nism ;  the  nymphs  have  not  the  true  eupeptic  stal- 
wartness  of  the  best  classicism.  In  music  this 
perfection  of  organism  is  of  even  more  importance 
as  an  indispensable  factor  of  beauty  of  form  than 
it  is  in  the  plastic  arts.  In  sculpture  and  painting 
the  internal  organism  is  not  revealed,  but  only  im- 
plied, and  we  can  judge  of  its  perfection  or  faulti- 


JOHANN   SEBASTIAN   BACH  81 

ness  only  by  the  particular  sort  of  beauty  we  descry 
in  the  outward  form  and  colour.  But  in  music  it 
is  far  otherwise  ;  what  might  be  called  the  surface 
of  musical  form  is  transparent ;  the  internal  struc- 
ture, what  I  call  the  organism,  of  the  composition 
shines  through  it  everywhere,  and  the  trained  ear 
detects  very  quickly  and  surely  whether  the  out- 
ward beauty  of  form  is  independent  of,  or  imme- 
diately conditioned  by,  a  finely  organized  construc- 
tion of  the  whole.  It  may  truly  be  said  that  such 
music  as  does  not  to  some  extent  embody  those  or- 
ganic structural  principles  which  we  find  in  Bach, 
has  had,  as  a  rule,  but  an  ephemeral  hold  on  the 
interest  and  sympathies  of  musicians.  This  is  but 
an  exemplification  of  the  very  principle  of  classic  art 
of  which  I  am  now  speaking.  Donizetti  and  Bel- 
lini, the  melodious  exterior  of  whose  music,  beauti- 
ful as  an  archangel,  but  thinly  veils  the  imperfect 
anatomy  of  a  mollusk,  are  already  falling  int©  ob- 
livion. A  Bach  chorus  is  eternal.  "What  further 
developments  the  art  has  undergone  since  Bach's 
day  have  been  in  a  certain  sense  superficial ;  they 
have,  for  the  most  part,  had  to  do  more  with  the 
external  aspect,  with  the  outward  shape  of  music. 
The  two  great  achievements  of  the  plastic  sort  that 
we  owe  to  composers  since  Bach  are  the  establish- 
ment of  the  sonata  form  and  the  perfection  of  the 
song  and  ballad  forms.  No  doubt  much  of  the 
6 


82  JOHAtftf  SEBASTIAN  BACH 

music  written  since  his  day,  even  much  of  the  very 
great  music,  has  dispensed  with  a  good  deal  of 
that  intricate  anatomy  which  we  find  pretty  con- 
stantly in  Bach's  compositions.  Still,  from  his 
time  down  to  the  present  day,  any  tendency  com- 
posers may  have  shown  to  dispense  with  it  entirely, 
except  in  the  very  smallest  and  flimsiest  forms  of 
composition,  has  been  pretty  surely  recognizable 
as  being  in  the  end  a  tendency  toward  a  decadence. 
It  would  seem  from  all  this  that  technique  was 
really  the  great  lever  with  which  Bach  raised  the 
art  of  composition  so  high  that  all  subsequent  ages 
have  felt  the  influence  of  the  mighty  lift  he  gave 
it.  Unquestionably  Bach's  astounding  technique 
in  composition  was  this  lever ;  but  the  full  extent 
of  this  technique  of  his  can  not  even  begin  to  be 
appreciated,  if  it  is  judged  only  by  the  feats  he 
accomplished  in  his  mastery  over  musical  form. 
He  put  his  technique  to  a  higher  use  than  the 
mere  production  of  formal  beauty.  If  he  was  th« 
greatest  of  musical  classicists,  he  was  equally  great 
as  a  musical  romanticist.  Beauty  of  musical  form 
was,  with  him,  not  only  the  outcome  of  a  perfect 
and  highly  organized  musical  construction,  but  it 
was  also,  and  primarily,  a  means  of  expression. 
His  music  strikes  roots  deep  into  human  life,  ex- 
perience, emotion,  and  aspiration.  He  did  not, 
like  the  absolute  classicists,  value  formal  beauty  for 


JOHANN  SEBASTIAN  BACH  83 

its  own  sake  alone,  but  meant  that  it  should  be, 
like  the  Church  Sacraments,  the  outward  sign  of 
the  inward  grace.  And  if  Bach  belongs  to  a  by- 
gone epoch  by  the  musical  forms  he  employed,  in 
this  romantic  phase  of  his  genius  he  is  essentially 
modern — modern  as  the  newest  and  most  original 
genius  of  our  own  day.  It  was  in  this  complete 
union  of  classicism  and  romanticism  that  Bach  was 
truly  original,  and  stood  as  a  new,  hitherto  unseen 
figure  before  the  world.  In  no  single  composer 
have  these  two  elements,  each  raised  to  its  highest 
known  potency,  been  so  completely  combined  as 
they  were  in  him.  He  forced  the  warm,  vital 
blood  of  romanticism  through  every  artery  and 
vein  of  even  the  most  complex  musical  organisms. 
No  matter  how  intricate  the  structure  of  a  compo- 
sition might  be,  no  matter  what  arduous  technical 
difficulties  might  attend  the  bringing  of  it  to  for- 
mal perfection,  Bach  knew  how  to  make  it  expres- 
sive. Listen  to  it  with  an  ear  that  pierces  through 
the  surface,  and  what  you  hear  is  not  the  mere 
whirring  of  the  cog-wheels  of  a  highly  perfected 
mechanism,  but  the  very  heart-beat  of  humanity  it- 
self. I  have  spoken  of  Bach's  enormous  technique  in 
composition  ;  it  was  in  the  use  he  made  of  this  tech- 
nique as  a  means  toward  the  prof  oundest  and  most 
exalted  poetic  expressiveness  in  music  that  Bach 
laid  the  foundation  of  wellnigh  all  that  has  shown 


84  JOHANN  SEBASTIAN  BACH 

signs  of  permanence  in  the  subsequent  develop- 
ment of  the  art.  Herein  lies  the  secret  of  the  im- 
mense and  far-reaching  influence  he  exerted  upon 
the  composers  who  came  after  him.  It  is  this 
complete  interpenetration  of  the  classic  and  roman- 
tic elements  that  we  find  in  Bach,  this  constant  ap- 
plication of  a  matchless  technique  to  the  highest 
artistic  ends,  that  render  the  study  of  his  works  so 
invaluable  to  all  musicians.  It  has  often  been  said 
that  Bach  is  not  a  good  model ;  this  is,  in  a  cer- 
tain sense,  true.  Bach's  works  properly  have  no 
place  in  an  elementary  course  of  musical  instruc- 
tion ;  the  Well-tempered  Clavichord  is  the  last 
book  I  would  let  a  pupil  in  fugue  look  into.  One 
must  have  mastered  a  good  deal  in  music  before  he 
is  able  to  learn  much  from  Bach.  The  practical 
study  of  the  art  of  composition  is  very  like  the 
practical  study  of  any  other  art.  I  once  asked  an 
experienced  pianoforte  -  teacher  what  he  thought 
of  the  two  books  of  Tausig's  daily  exercises  for 
the  pianoforte.  "  Oh,"  said  he,  "  Tausig's  ex- 
ercises were  meant  for  pianists,  not  for  pupils. 
The  word  dangerous  ought  to  be  stamped  across 
every  copy.  They  might  lame  a  pupil's  hand  and 
wrist  for  life."  Just  so  Bach's  works  in  their 
higher  sphere ;  problems  are  solved  in  them,  of 
the  true  nature  and  scope  of  which  the  beginner 
has  no  notion.     No  man  ever  equalled  Shakspere 


JOHANN"   SEBASTIAN  BACH  85 

in  his  power  of  using  the  English  language ;  but 
we  do  not  teach  our  children  English  grammar 
from  his  plays,  for  all  that.  If  we  did,  they 
would  probably  speak  the  "most  worstest"  of 
English  soon  enough. 

If  Bach  was  essentially  modern  in  his  romanti- 
cism, he  was  also  modern  in  his  keen  perception  of 
the  adaptability  of  musical  means  to  musical  ends. 
It  has  been  said  of  Hector  Berlioz  that,  unlike 
many  composers,  he  never  conceived  of  a  musical 
passage  as  a  piece  of  abstract  form,  but  that  a  me- 
lody came  to  his  mind  not  only  as  a  certain  succes- 
sion of  notes  in  a  certain  rhythm,  but  invested  from 
the  beginning  with  its  appropriate  clang-tint. 
When  he  invented  a  melody  it  was  not  merely  a 
melody  absolutely,  but  a  melody  for  clarinet,  for 
bassoon,  for  horn,  for  a  tenor  voice ;  form  and 
colour  were,  in  his  mind,  inseparable.  We  dis- 
cover a  very  similar  trait  in  Bach.  In  no  composer 
of  his  day,  nor  before  his  time,  does  it  appear  that 
the  particular  instruments  or  voices  for  which  he 
wrote  played  so  functional  a  part  in  his  inspira- 
tion. Bach  seems  to  have  drawn  inspiration  not 
only  from  the  poetic  subject  he  was  to  treat  and 
from  the  musical  form  in  which  he  worked,  but 
also  from  the  very  nature  of  the  material  he  em- 
ployed. It  was  with  him  often  as  it  would  be 
with  a  sculptor  who  found  his  very  clay  inspiring. 


86  JOHANN   SEBASTIAN  BACH 

A  notable  example  of  this  is  the  manner  in  which 
he  treated  the  organ. 

Of  all  writers  for  the  organ  he  best  perceived 
wherein  the  essential  strength  of  the  instrument 
lay.  He  saw  clearly  just  what  the  organ  could 
do  best,  and  what  was  its  one  virtue  that  was 
possessed  by  no  other  instrument  nor  body  of  in- 
struments. Handel  and  Mendelssohn  saw  clearly 
enough  what  the  true  character  and  mission  of 
the  organ  were ;  but  they  could  not  draw  inspira- 
tion from  this  character  as  Bach  could,  and  when 
they  wrote  for  the  organ  one  often  feels  that  they 
might  as  well  have  written  for  something  else. 
But  when  Bach  wrote  for  the  organ  the  very  soul 
of  the  instrument  was  in  him. 

The  one  point  which  differentiates  the  organ 
from  all  other  instruments  is  that  it  has  no  ac- 
cent, no  power  of  emphasis.  Its  tone  is  dead. 
True,  it  can  be  swelled  or  diminished,  but  its 
swell  is  not  like  the  crescendo  of  a  chorus  or 
orchestra,  a  gradual  increase  of  concerted  personal 
energy,  with  a  human  heart  beating  harder  and 
harder  behind  every  successive  note ;  it  is  like 
the  growing  roar  of  the  approaching  storm,  an 
inconscient  force,  irresistible  if  you  will,  but 
wholly  impersonal.  Yet  the  swell,  much  as  it  is 
prized  and  outrageously  abused  by  modern  orga- 
nists, is  an  item  of  comparatively  small  importance 


JOHANN  SEBASTIAN   BACH  87 

in  the  organ.  The  prime  characteristic  of  the  in- 
strument is  its  perfectly  even,  sustained,  and  im- 
personal tone ;  it  never  takes  breath,  it  has  no 
inflection.  It  is  Bach's  complete  sympathy  with 
this  quality  of  the  instrument  that  makes  his 
organ  works  so  unique.  Some  of  his  greater  organ 
pieces  have  been  arranged  for  orchestra  :  the  Pas- 
sacaglia  in  C  minor  and  the  Toccata  in  F.  These 
arrangements  have  been  much  admired,  but  they 
seem  to  me  very  horrible.  It  is  claimed  that  they 
give  greater  variety  in  tone-colour  ;  so  they  do,  and 
this  is  one  reason  why  I  object  to  them.  This 
variety  seems  weak  and  trivial  where  it  is  not 
needed.  Yet  my  greatest  objection  to  these  tran- 
scriptions is,  after  all,  that  the  orchestra  can  not 
play  them  without  accent,  without  a  certain 
human  inflection.  The  phrase  no  longer  rolls  out 
in  one  continuous  breath ;  it  is  chopped  up  into 
rhythmic  divisions  which  give  it  the  triviality  of 
human  utterance,  where  it  should  ring  out  like 
a  force  of  Nature  made  vocal.  This  succession 
of  pigmy  blows  is  no  substitute  for  the  steady, 
irresistible  push  of  the  organ  tone.  Some  modern 
organists,  Saint-Saens  among  them,  are  in  favour 
of  playing  Bach's  fugues  in  a  gradual  crescendo, 
beginning  soft  and  ending  with  the  full  power  of 
the  organ.  The  idea  seems  reasonable  enough, 
for  the  fugue  form  is  in  itself  a  constant  ideal 


88  JOHANN  SEBASTIAN  BACH 

crescendo,  not  in  physical  tone,  but  in  musical  in- 
terest and  excitement. 

But,  well  as  Bach  understood  the  organ,  and 
fully  as  he  entered  into  the  true  spirit  of  the  in- 
strument, his  other  compositions  are  conceived  in 
a  totally  different  one.  When  he  writes  for  other 
instruments  or  for  voices  hardly  a  trace  of  this 
remote,  superhuman  impassiveness  remains.  And 
if  his  organ  works  are  great,  his  choral  works  are 
still  greater.  Here  his  romanticism  shows  itself 
in  its  full  poetic  vigour.  Here,  too,  his  keen  per- 
ception of  the  adaptation  of  means  to  ends  is  dis- 
played quite  as  forcibly,  if  perhaps  not  in  quite 
so  unique  a  way,  as  in  his  organ  works.  In  his 
Church-cantatas,  the  composition  of  his  orchestra, 
his  choice  of  instruments,  is  almost  invariably 
felicitous,  guided  by  a  poetic  conception  of  the 
character  of  his  subject.  In  his  treatment  of  the 
human  voice,  too,  he  never  seems  to  do  anything 
at  random.  Take  his  cantatas  all  together,  and 
you  find  that  his  contralto  airs  and  recitatives  have, 
as  a  rule,  quite  a  different  character  from  those 
written  for  a  soprano  voice.  The  character  and 
spirit  of  the  poetical  texts  are  different.  The 
same  is  true  of  the  airs  for  tenor  or  for  bass. 
Each  of  the  four  male  and  female  voices  seems  to 
be  identified  in  his  mind  with  certain  psychical 
conditions,   with    particular  phases    of    religious 


JOHANN   SEBASTIAN   BACH  89 

sentiment,  and  by  merely  reading  the  text  of  an 
air  you  can  often  predict  what  voice  he  will  write 
it  for.  It  is,  upon  the  whole,  in  the  Church- 
cantatas  that  we  find  Bach's  genius  displayed  in 
its  fullest  power,  expressiveness,  variety,  and  poetic 
imaginativeness.  As  his  music  in  general,  viewed 
from  a  purely  musical  point  of  view,  combines 
the  highest  finish  and  often  intricacy  of  detail 
with  the  greatest  clearness  of  general  plan,  the 
complex  beauty  of  detail- work  serving  to  adorn 
but  never  to  blur  the  main  outlines  of  a  compo- 
sition, so  do  we  also  find  in  his  Church-cantatas 
that  the  music  not  only  reflects  the  general  spirit 
of  the  text,  but  often  lends  itself  to  the  expres- 
sion of  the  most  delicate  shades  of  emotion,  to 
following  out  the  text  sentence  by  sentence  and 
word  by  word. 

Kobert  Franz  writes  on  this  point : 

4 'In  his  Church  works  Bach  calls  to  his  aid  a  treatment 
of  musical  forms  which  is  peculiar  to  himself.  A  form  does 
not  merely  furnish  him  the  means  of  producing  a  concrete 
picture  of  the  idea  contained  in  the  text,  but  he  imputes  to 
it  a  special  symbolical  significance.  He  thus  sublimates  the 
traditional  forms  by  bringing  their  structural  plan  into  an 
immediate  relation  with  the  inner  meaning  of  his  subject. 
One  need  have  no  hesitation  in  setting  up,  as  a  general  rule, 
that  the  more  ingeniously  complex  the  forms  he  employs 
are,  the  more  surely  can  one  count  upon  there  being  a  corre- 
spondingly startling  thought  behind  those  exceptional  means 


90  JOHANN  SEBASTIAN  BACH 

of  expression.  A  poetic  perception  of  the  sense  of  the  text 
will,  in  general,  solve  the  riddle  quickly  and  surely.  A 
multitude  of  instances  attest  the  truth  of  this  ;  criticism  has 
already  thrown  light  upon  some  of  them,  but  many  others 
are  still  shrouded  in  obscurity,  which  devoted  study  will 
sooner  or  later  dispel." 

No  man  ever  had  a  keener  sense  for  the  pic- 
turesque, in  the  highest  sense  of  the  term,  than 
Bach.  He  eagerly  grasps  every  opportunity  the 
text  affords  him  to  present  a  definite  picture  to 
the  mind's  eye  ;  a  metaphor,  an  historical  or  local 
allusion,  a  picturesque  phrase,  a  simile,  are  all 
food  for  his  passion  for  tone-painting.  His  music 
not  only  expresses,  but,  in  the  fullest  sense,  illus- 
trates the  text.  This  trait  is  noticeable  in  his  airs 
and  choruses  as  well  as  in  his  recitatives.  In  a 
chorus  to  the  words  :  "  They  shall  all  come  out  of 
Sheba,  bringing  gold  and  frankincense,  and  sing- 
ing the  praise  of  the  Lord,"  the  music  shows  to 
the  inner  eye,  as  far  as  music  may,  a  perfect  pic- 
ture of  an  Eastern  caravan ;  you  see  the  whole 
scene  before  you,  the  motley  procession,  drivers 
calling  from  one  end  of  the  line  to  the  other,  bells 
jingling  on  the  camels'  harnesses,  swords  gleaming 
in  the  sunlight.  In  another  chorus  to  the  words  : 
"  He  who  exalteth  himself  shall  be  humbled,"  the 
music  trebles  the  significance  of  the  text.  I  know 
no  finer  stroke  of  divine  irony  in  all  art,  nothing 


JOHANN  SEBASTIAN  BACH  91 

more  picturesque  in  all  poetry,  than  the  way  in 
which  this  flaunting  theme  struggles  its  way  up 
through  the  compass  of  an  octave,  and  then  sneaks 
whining  down  again  by  semitones,  as  if  with  its 
tail  between  its  legs.  In  a  contralto  air  the  words  : 
"  I  stand  here  by  the  wayside  and  gaze  yearningly 
after  Thee,"  inspire  him  with  a  piece  of  suggestive 
tone-painting,  unsurpassed  for  vividness  and  depth 
of  pathos.  Nothing  in  the  whole  psychical  ex- 
perience of  man,  nothing  in  the  world  we  live  in, 
lay  without  the  pale  of  his  sympathy.  There  is 
no  tinge  of  asceticism  in  his  religious  sentiment ; 
he  was  a  true  Lutheran,  and  to  him  the  earth  was 
but  the  road  to  heaven.  Beauty  always  compelled 
his  homage.  When  he  sings  :  "Joy  turns  to  sad- 
ness, beauty  fades  as  a  flower,  the  greatest  strength 
grows  weak,  fortune  changes  with  time ;  it  is  soon 
over  with  honour  and  glory ;  knowledge  and  all 
that  man  imagines  is  soon  brought  to  naught  by 
the  grave,"  you  feel  that  he  is  fully  possessed  with 
the  solemnity  of  this  statement  of  the  transitori- 
ness  of  all  things  earthly ;  but  when  he  comes  to 
the  fading  flower,  his  voice  falters,  and  solemnity 
turns  to  tender  pathos.  As  a  writer  of  recitative, 
Bach  stands  pre-eminent ;  other  later  composers 
may  have  pushed  recitative  to  more  dramatic  bril- 
liancy, but  in  narrative  and,  so  to  speak,  didactic 
recitative,  he  is  the  unapproached  master.     The 


92  JOHANN  SEBASTIAN  BACH 

recitatives  in  his  Church-cantatas  carry  more  con- 
viction with  them,  more  spiritual  admonition  and 
exhortation,  than  any  sermon. 

But  how  is  it  then  that  this  great  man,  who  unites 
in  himself  all  the  highest  powers  that  can  fall  to 
the  lot  of  a  composer,  still  stands  so  remote  from 
popular  appreciation  ?  He  had  everything — beauty, 
grace,  elegance,  sublimity,  fire,  brilliancy,  expres- 
siveness ;  in  none  of  these  particulars  has  he  ever 
been  surpassed  :  and  yet  he  is  still  virtually  un- 
known, a  sealed  book  to  most  music-lovers  !  The 
truth  is  all  too  patent,  and  much  as  we  who  love 
Bach  best  may  kick  at  acknowledging  it,  we  must 
in  the  end  acknowledge  that  there  is  no  probability 
of  his  ever  becoming  popular.  He  speaks  an 
obsolete  idiom  ;  the  Latin  of  Virgil  and  the  Greek 
of  Homer  are  not  more  dead  than  Bach's  musical 
language  ;  the  tragedies  of  ^Eschylus  are  not  more 
foreign  to  the  habits  of  the  modern  stage  than  the 
style  of  Bach's  music  is  to  that  of  our  day.  And 
music  can  not  be  translated  as  Greek  and  Latin 
can.  The  difficulty  the  average  music-lover  ex- 
periences in  seeing  through  Bach's  music  is  great ; 
all  in  it  is  so  unaccustomed.  The  old  outcry  of 
lack  of  melody  comes  up  on  every  hand ;  but,  in 
honest  truth,  not  to  find  melody  in  Bach  is  like 
not  being  able  to  see  the  wood  because  of  the  trees 
that  are  there.     True,  the  perception  of  melody, 


JOHANN   SEBASTIAN   BACH  93 

the  understanding  of  musical  form,  no  matter  how 
unaccustomed,  can  come  with  habituation.  But 
the  means  of  habituating  the  public  to  Bach's 
music,  especially  to  his  great  cantatas,  are  almost 
hopelessly  beyond  our  reach.  These  cantatas  are 
terribly  difficult ;  the  airs,  in  particular,  are 
almost  impossible  to  singers  to-day.  The  mere 
vocal  executive  power  they  require,  although  often 
unquestionably  great,  is  not  excessive.  Things  of 
equal  technical  difficulty  are  still  sung  quite 
fluently.  The  real  difficulty  is  more  intellectual 
and  artistic,  in  the  higher  sense,  than  technical. 
Few  singers  to-day  are  in  better  condition 
thoroughly  to  understand  an  air  by  Bach  than 
the  public  itself  is  ;  and  they  have  no  traditions 
to  guide  them,  as  they  have  in  Handel's  case — 
not  even  bad  ones.  Then  comes  the  whole  vexed 
question  of  "  additional  accompaniments/'  of 
how  the  many  gaps  Bach,  like  Handel,  left  in  the 
orchestral  part  of  his  scores  are  to  be  filled  out. 
Let  it  be  enough  for  me  merely  to  hint  at  this 
difficulty  here ;  to  discuss  it  would  lead  me  too 
far. 

Added  to  these  difficulties,  which  make  a  satis- 
factory performance  of  Bach's  choral  works  pro- 
blematical to-day,  the  public  has  to  face  one  of 
another  sort,  one  which  touches  itself  only.  This 
is  the  great  difficulty  of  listening  to  music  in  an  un- 


94  JOHANN   SEBASTIAN  BACH 

accustomed  and  often  exceedingly  intricate  style 
intelligently,  and  in  the  right  way.  In  this  mat- 
ter, as  elsewhere,  Eobert  Franz  is  the  best  guide. 
He  writes  : 

"  To  my  mind  it  is  far  less  important  with  Bach  (i.e.,  in 
his  choruses)  to  follow  out  the  web  of  voices  in  all  its  details : 
as,  in  a  cathedral,  the  countless  details  of  ornamentation 
only  serve  to  impart  life  and  movement  to  the  whole,  hut  do 
not  distract  the  spectator's  attention  therefrom,  so  is  it  also 
with  Bach's  polyphonic  writing.  Bach's  harmonic  progres- 
sions unfold  themselves,  for  the  most  part,  in  large,  broad 
proportions, — his  fundamental  basses  point  to  this  clearly 
enough,— but  he  seems  to  resolve  these  groups  into  smaller 
ones  by  a  melodically  flowing  leading  of  the  voices,  which 
gives  rise  to  a  multitude  of  subsidiary  harmonies  that  busily 
push  their  way  hither  and  thither.  Now,  he  who  should  try 
to  follow  these  smaller  groups,  as  they  flit  rapidly  by,  would 
come  to  grief,  for  the  reason  that  before  one  of  them  has  ac- 
quired a  complete,  well-rounded  form,  another  is  already 
pushing  its  way  to  the  front,  only  to  give  place  just  as  quick- 
ly to  a  third,  so  that  all  these  separate  details  seem  to  elude 
the  ear.  The  true  significance  of  the  detail-work,  as  of  the 
whole,  is  lost  when  one  listens  to  Bach  in  this  fashion.  One 
should  far  rather  seek  to  grasp  those  larger  proportions,  try 
to  reconstruct  them  inwardly  for  one's  self,  and  thus  learn  to 
look  from  this  firm  basis  securely  and  intelligently  into  the 
apparently  entangled,  but  really  highly  ingenious  and  orga- 
nically developed  labyrinth  of  the  several  voices.  Then  will 
those  details  in  which  the  centre  of  gravity  lies,  which  have 
the  decisive  word  to  say,  and  are  the  chief  exponents  of  the 
composer's  artistic  intention,  stand  out  in  all  due  promi* 


JOHANN  SEBASTIAN  BACH  95 

nence  of  themselves  ;  and  all  that  is  merely  auxiliary,  and 
that  tends  bnt  to  add  elegance  and  finish  of  style  to  the  musi- 
cal form,  will  no  longer  disturb  nor  mislead.  The  secret  of 
Bach's  leading  of  the  voices  resides  in  the  close  relation  each 
separate  voice  bears  to  the  whole ;  consequently  the  under- 
standing must  first  of  all  keep  in  view  the  development  of 
the  whole,  and,  through  this,  seek  to  find  its  bearings  amidst 
the  throng  of  minor  details.  Even  the  musician  can  not 
safely  leave  this  out  of  consideration  in  his  most  exhaustive 
study  of  a  work  down  to  its  minutest  details." 

The  student  who  is  anxious  to  practise  this  sort 
of  listening  to  Bach,  recommended  by  Franz,  will 
find  the  hardest  part  of  the  work  done  for  him,  so 
to  say,  in  one  of  the  composer's  instrumental 
works :  in  the  C  major  concerto  for  three  clavi- 
chords with  string  accompaniment.  Hardly  any- 
thing, even  by  Bach,  is  richer  in  minute  florid 
detail-work  than  this  concerto  ;  but  leave  aside  the 
three  clavichord  parts,  and  play  (if  possible,  a  good 
pianoforte  arrangement  of)  the  string  accompani- 
ment by  itself,  and  the  main  outlines  of  the  music 
stand  before  you  unobscured.  And  here  I  come 
to  the  best  and  most  fruitful  means  of  initiation 
into  the  sacred  mysteries  of  Bach's  art,  for  such 
initiation  can  hardly  be  looked  for  in  concert-halls. 
Take  Bach  home  with  you  and  commune  with  him 
there  over  your  own  pianoforte ;  study  him  with 
loving  diligence,  taking  first  what  happens  most 
to  strike  your  personal  fancy, — for  even  in  Bach 


96  JOHANN  SEBASTIAN  BACH 

there  are  some  things  which  almost  any  one  can 
like, — and  thus  habituate  yourself  to  his  style.  I 
know  of  no  finer,  deeper,  nor  higher  musical  edu- 
cation. In  a  word,  sweeping  as  the  statement  may 
seem,  I  make  it  circumspectly  and  with  complete 
conviction,  that  there  is  no  more  trustworthy 
gauge  of  a  man's  musical  nature  and  culture  than 
his  appreciation  and  love  for  Bach.  In  him  you 
find  what  is  highest,  noblest,  and  best  in  music ; 
and,  furthermore,  it  is  through  him  that  the  other 
great  composers  are  best  to  be  appreciated.  A 
devotee  of  Beethoven  who  ignores  Bach  is  a  sus- 
picious person  to  me  ;  I  do  not  believe  he  sees  half 
the  greatness  of  Beethoven.  A  Wagner  worship- 
per, who  calls  the  Well-tempered  Clavichord  dry 
and  antiquated,  is  no  true  Wagnerian.  I  once 
asked  a  man,  coming  out  from  a  concert  which 
ended  with  a  stirring  chorus  by  Bach  :  "  Well,  how 
do  you  feel  after  that  last  chorus  ?  "  He  replied  : 
"  I  have  come  to  the  conclusion  that  some  people 
are  born  to  enjoy  Bach,  and  others  are  not.  I  was 
not ! "  I  might  have  answered  back  that  some 
people  were  born  musical,  and  others  could  not 
have  musicianship  thrust  upon  them.  But  I  held 
my  peace  and  said  nothing. 


ADDITIONAL  ACCOMPANIMENTS 

TO  BACH'S  AND  HANDEL'S 

SCORES 


ADDITIONAL  ACCOMPANIMENTS 

TO  BACH'S  AND  HANDEL'S 

SCOEES 

Der  Stoff  gewinnt  erst  seinen  Werth 
Durch  kilnstlerische  Gestaltung. 

— Heinbich  Heine,  ScMpfungdieder. 

It  is  both  fortunate  and  unfortunate  that  people 
in  general  have  fallen  into  the  habit  of  regarding 
Bach  and  Handel  with  a  rather  careless  admira- 
tion. Those  great  names  are  too  often  treated 
with  mere  after-dinner-speech  complacency.  This 
is  fortunate  in  so  far  as  the  admiration,  if  care- 
less and  of  somewhat  second-hand  quality,  is  after 
all  respectful,  and  offers  no  opposition  to  what- 
ever serious  attempts  may  be  made  toward  doing 
real  honour  to  the  great  composers'  works  ;  unfor- 
tunate, as  it  tends  to  induce  a  too  lukewarm  in- 
terest in  the  painstaking  study  of  what  is  most 
to  be  cherished  in  the  rich  legacy  bequeathed  to 
the  world  by  Bach  and  Handel,  without  which 
study  our  appreciation  of  its  worth  is  unintelli- 
gent and  undiscriminating. 


100     ADDITIONAL  ACCOMPANIMENTS   TO 

Although  the  astounding  development  purely 
instrumental  music  has  undergone  at  the  hands 
of  Haydn,  Mozart,  Beethoven,  and  others  may 
seem  to  throw  the  instrumental  works  of  Bach 
and  Handel  into  the  shade,  it  must  be  recognized 
that  in  the  department  of  vocal  composition  the 
world  has  produced  very  little  that  can  bear  com- 
parison with  their  monumental  oratorios  and  can- 
tatas. It  seems  strange  at  first  sight  that,  while 
we  can  bring  about  an  excellent  performance  of 
so  huge  a  score  as  Berlioz's  Danremont  Requiem, 
with  its  four  supplementary  orchestras  of  brass 
instruments,  eight  pairs  of  kettle-drums,  and  all 
its  imposing  vocal  and  orchestral  panoply,  we 
stand  comparatively  impotent  before  so  apparently 
simple  a  work  as  Handel's  Athalia.  In  the  for- 
mer case  it  is  a  mere  question  of  good-will,  orches- 
tral resources,  and  money ;  in  the  latter,  a  ques- 
tion of  something  far  more  difficult  to  procure. 

In  looking  over  the  pages  of  a  Bach  or  Handel 
score  we  are  struck  at  once  with  the  apparent 
meagreness  of  the  instrumental  portion.  While 
the  voices  are  treated  with  all  the  elaborate  care 
characteristic  of  the  composers'  day,  the  instru- 
mental part  seems  to  have  been  unaccountably 
neglected.  In  some  places  the  orchestral  accom- 
paniment is  worked  out  with  the  same  elaborateness 
as  the  voice-parts ;  in  others  we  find  little  or  no- 


bach's  and  handel's  scores       101 

thing  more  than  an  instrumental  bass  to  support 
the  voices.  But  on  closer  inspection  we  find  that 
this  bass  is  in  many  cases  accompanied  by  a  curious 
series  of  Arabic  numerals,  which  were  evidently 
not  put  there  for  nothing.  In  fact,  both  Bach  and 
Handel  were  in  the  habit  of  writing  a  great  part  of 
their  music  in  that  species  of  short-hand  known  to 
the  initiated  as  a  figured  bass.  Wherever  there 
seems  to  be  a  lack  of  instrumental  accompaniment 
in  their  scores  we  may  be  sure  that  the  bass  con- 
tains the  germ  from  which  it  is  to  be  developed. 
This  bass  is  called  the  continuo  or  basso  continuo; 
and  until  it  is  developed  into  full  harmony,  until 
the  frequent  gaps  in  the  score  are  filled  out,  any- 
thing like  an  adequate  performance  of  the  work  is 
out  of  the  question.  In  the  composers'  time  this 
filling-out  was  probably  done  by  themselves,  or 
under  their  direction,  on  the  organ  or  harpsichord. 
The  organist  played  either  directly  from  the  con- 
tinuo itself  or  from  an  organ-part  prepared  from 
it.  Passages  which  the  composer  did  not  intend  to 
be  played  in  full  harmony  were  marked  "tasto 
solo ;  "  the  other  portions  were  often  elaborately 
figured,  that  is,  the  harmony  was  indicated  by  fi- 
gures written  under  the  continuo.  In  many  in- 
stances the  figuring  was  omitted,  the  choice  of 
harmony  being  then  far  more  problematical.  It  is 
generally  supposed  that  in  such  cases  the  composer 


102     ADDITIONAL  ACCOMPANIMENTS  TO 

meant  to  play  the  organ  himself,  or  else  that,  al- 
though the  figuring  is  not  to  be  found  in  the  score, 
it  was  written  down  by  the  composer  in  the  separate 
part  from  which  the  organist  was  to  play,  and  has 
since  been  lost. 

It  will  easily  be  seen  that  the  manner  in  which 
Bach's  and  HandePs  continuos  are  worked  out  is 
by  no  means  a  matter  of  indifference,  inasmuch  as 
a  very  vital  and  essential  element  in  their  music 
depends  thereon.  The  subject  has  given  rise  to 
much  discussion,  which  has  to-day  assumed  the 
proportions  of  an  actual  pen-and-ink  war.  Mu- 
sician after  musician  has  tried  his  hand  at  working 
out  the  continuo  in  scores  by  the  old  masters,  with 
very  varying  success.  To  distinguish  those  parts 
which  were  actually  written  out  by  the  composers 
themselves  from  the  indispensable  additions  made 
to  the  score  by  other  hands,  the  former  are  called 
"  original  parts  ; "  the  latter  are  generally  known 
by  the  name  of  "additional  accompaniments. " 
The  violence  of  the  discussion  on  the  subject  of 
additional  accompaniments  now  going  on  in  Ger- 
many, and  its  direct  bearing  upon  the  all-im- 
portant problem  of  how  to  insure  an  adequate 
performance  of  Bach's  and  Handel's  vocal  works, 
make  it  interesting  to  see  how  the  two  present  con- 
tending parties  arose. 

It  should  be  borne  in  mind  that,  in  so  far  as  the 


bach's  and  handel's  scores       103 

familiarity  of  the  public  with  Bach's  works  is  con- 
cerned, Sebastian  Bach  is  practically  a  more  mo- 
dern composer  even  than  Beethoven.  That  is,  the 
public  recognition  of  his  works  is  of  more  re- 
cent date.  For  a  long  period,  during  which  the 
works  of  Haydn  and  Mozart  had  become  familiar 
as  household  words,  and  Beethoven  —  yes,  even 
Weber,  Mendelssohn,  and  Schumann — was  very 
generally  known  and  admired,  Sebastian  Bach  was 
known  only  by  name,  save  to  a  few  choice  spirits. 
Organists  knew  his  organ  works,  and  his  Well- 
tempered  Clavichord  had  been  studied  by  musi- 
cians ;  but  his  oratorios  and  cantatas  were  all  but 
unheard  of. 

How  hard  Mendelssohn  and  one  or  two  other 
men  worked  to  bring  the  public  at  large  into  di- 
rect relations  with  some  of  Bach's  more  important 
compositions  is  well  known.  The  task  was  a  se- 
vere one,  as  nearly  all  of  Bach's  vocal  works  ex- 
isted only  in  manuscript.  Mendelssohn  succeed- 
ed, however,  in  having  the  St.  Matthew-Passion 
brought  out  at  the  Berlin  Sing- Akademie,  and  later 
in  the  Thomas-Kirche  in  Leipzig,  the  very  church 
in  which  Bach  himself  had  held  the  position  of  or- 
ganist, and  in  bringing  one  or  two  of  his  orchestral 
suites  to  performance  at  the  Gewandhaus.  The  an- 
nual performance  of  the  Passion  on  Good  Friday 
soon  grew  to  be  a  fixed  institution  ;  a  large  portion 


104     ADDITIONAL  ACCOMPANIMENTS  TO 

of  the  public  all  over  North  Germany  got  to  regard 
this  work  with  peculiar  veneration.  The  St.  John- 
Passion  was  also  given  annually  at  another  church, 
the  Pauliner-Kirche,  but  was  not  so  generally  ad- 
mired as  its  mighty  companion.  The  Gewandhaus 
orchestra  continued  playing  the  D  minor  suite, 
more  as  a  matter  of  routine  than  anything  else,  for 
their  audiences  were  hugely  bored  by  it. 

The  fruits  of  Mendelssohn's  strenuous  endeavours 
in  the  cause  of  Bach  were  practically  limited  to 
this.  Few  persons  knew,  and  still  fewer  cared, 
about  the  existence  of  some  three  hundred  Church- 
cantatas  from  the  great  master's  pen ;  surely  very 
few  indeed  suspected  the  fact  that  these  cantatas 
were  one  of  the  most  precious  mines  of  musical 
riches  the  world  ever  possessed.  It  was  not  until 
some  time  after  Mendelssohn's  death  that  the 
world  at  large  began  to  learn  anything  about 
them. 

"With  Handel  the  case  was  somewhat  different. 
Although  his  works  have  never,  to  this  day,  won 
anything  like  general  popularity  in  Germany,  the 
few  musicians  and  musical  savants  who  were  in- 
terested in  Handel  took  more  active  measures  to 
have  his  oratorios  publicly  performed  than  the 
Bach-lovers  did,  on  their  side  ;  witness  the  pre- 
ponderance of  Handel's  vocal  works,  which  had 
been    supplied  with  additional  accompaniments, 


bach's  and  handel's  scores       105 

over  works  by  Bach  for  which  similar  things  had 
been  done  in  Mendelssohn's  time.  Several  com- 
pleted scores  of  Handel  (made  by  Mozart,  Mosel, 
and  others)  were  ready  for  use  by  choral  societies, 
whereas  almost  nothing  by  Bach  existed  in  a  per- 
formable  shape.  The  violent  discussions  between 
"  Bachianer"  and  "  Handelianer,"  about  which 
the  world  has  since  heard  a  good  deal,  interested 
only  the  parties  actively  engaged  in  them  ;  the  out- 
side world  cared  nothing  whatever  about  the  whole 
question.  Indeed  it  was  hardly  possible  that  any 
general  enthusiasm  should  be  felt  on  the  subject 
at  a  time  when  new  works  by  Mendelssohn  and 
Schumann  were  continually  making  appeals  to 
public  interest,  when  Weber  was  occupying  every 
one's  attention,  and  Richard  Wagner  was  already 
beginning  to  stir  up  all  the  musical  elements  in 
Germany  into  astonished,  chaotic  strife  with  his 
operas  and  theoretical  pamphlets. 

Yet  the  true  Bach  and  Handel-lovers  were  not 
idle.  Three  years  after  Mendelssohn's  death  se- 
veral musicians  and  men  interested  in  the  cause 
came  together  in  Leipzig,  to  debate  upon  the  prac- 
ticability of  publishing  a  complete  edition  of  the 
works  of  Johann  Sebastian  Bach.  They  decided 
that  this  undertaking  could  be  carried  out  only  by 
subscription,  as  the  demand  for  such  music  in  the 
market  was  virtually  null.     Accordingly  the  now 


106      ADDITIONAL   ACCOMPANIMENTS   TO 

well-known  Bach  Society  l  was  formed,  the  chief 
founders  of  which  were  0.  F.  Becker,  the  firm 
of  Breitkopf  &  Hartel,  Moritz  Hauptman,  Otto 
Jahn,  and  Eobert  Schumann.  The  edition  was  to 
be  published  by  Breitkopf  &  Hartel.  The  mat- 
ter must  have  been  taken  up  with  a  good  deal  of 
energy,  for  on  July  28,  1850 — the  centennial  anni- 
versary of  Bach's  death — an  official  circular  soli- 
citing subscriptions  was  sent  out  over  Germany. 
Subscriptions  came  in  quite  rapidly,  and  among  a 
host  of  names  on  the  list  we  find  especially  promi- 
nent those  of  Franz  Liszt,  Ignaz  Moscheles,  Louis 
Spohr,  and  A.  B.  Marx.  The  first  volume,  con- 
taining ten  Church-cantatas  in  score,  appeared  in 
December,  1851.  A  list  of  the  then  existing  sub- 
scribers, classified  according  to  their  places  of 
residence,  was  printed  with  the  volume.  It  is  not 
uninteresting  to  note  in  this  list,  under  the  head 
"Boston,"  the  single  American  name  " Herr 
Parker,  J.  C.  B.,  TonMnstler ."  The  society  has 
since  then  continued  publishing  volume  after  vo- 
lume, and  the  edition  has  at  the  present  date 
reached  its  twenty-fourth  volume.2     But,  in  spite 

i  This  Deutsche  Bach-Gesellschaft  (German  Bach  Society),  which  to- 
day counts  among  its  members  distinguished  musicians  and  music-lovers 
all  over  Europe  and  in  many  parts  of  America,  must  not  be  confounded 
with  the  Leipziger  Bach-Verein  (Bach  Association),  a  totally  distinct 
society,  which  was  organized  much  later. 

9  This  was  in  1878 ;  the  edition  now,  in  1894,  comprises  forty  volumes. 


bach's  and  handel's  scores       107 

of  these  labours  of  the  Bach  Society,  which  were, 
after  all,  prompted  quite  as  much  by  an  archaeo- 
logico-historical  as  by  a  purely  musical  interest  in 
Bach's  works,  the  general  love  for  Bach  kept 
pretty  much  in  statu  quo. 

Some  years  after  the  appearance  of  the  Bach  cir- 
cular another  organization,  the  Handel  Society, 
was  formed,  for  the  purpose  of  publishing  a  com- 
plete edition  of  Handel's  works.  It  was  conducted 
on  precisely  the  same  principles,  with  one  excep- 
tion, as  the  other  body,  and  its  edition  was  pub- 
lished by  the  same  firm.  The  first  volume,  con- 
taining the  dramatic  oratorio  of  Susannah,  ap- 
peared in  October,  1858.  That  a  somewhat  more 
vital  musical  interest  in  its  task  was  felt  by  this  or- 
ganization than  by  its  fellow  society  is  evident  from 
the  fact  that,  in  its  edition,  all  the  scores  of  Han- 
del's vocal  works  are  accompanied  with  a  written- 
out  part  for  organ  or  pianoforte,  in  which  the  bare 
places  in  the  score  are  filled  out  according  to  the 
figured  basso  continuo.  In  the  Bach  edition  there 
is  nothing  of  the  sort,  but  only  the  incomplete 
score,  just  as  the  composer  left  it.  Thus,  while 
the  Bach  Society  gave  to  the  world  an  edition 
of  that  master's  works  which  was  historically  va- 
luable, and  only  that,  in  so  far  as  the  vocal  scores 
were  concerned,  the  Handel  Society  took  active 
measures  to  make  the  vocal  scores  in   its  edi- 


108      ADDITIONAL  ACCOMPANIMENTS   TO 

tion  available  for  actual  performance  by  choral 
bodies. 

The  champion  of  the  latter  society  was  Fried- 
rich  Chrysander,  a  man  who  had  always  assumed 
the  attitude  of  an  almost  exclusive  admirer  of  Han- 
del, and  in  his  writings  seldom  let  slip  a  chance  of 
saying  something  invidious  about  Bach.  Chry- 
sander  had  somewhat  more  prestige  as  a  musical 
authority  than  any  one  on  the  Bach  side.  An- 
other man  was  G-.  G.  Gervinus,  who,  although  not 
a  musician,  had  somehow  got  bitten  with  the  Han- 
del mania,  and  allowed  his  Handel-worship  to  ex- 
pand into  all  the  implacable  bigotry  of  an  ama- 
teur. As  most  of  Handel's  vocal  works  were 
originally  written  to  English  words,  Gervinus  was 
of  no  slight  service  to  the  Handel  Society  in  sup- 
plying it  with  German  translations  for  its  edition. 
That  an  eminent  litt'erateur  like  Gervinus  should 
have  been  willing  to  wade  through  the  unspeak- 
able balderdash  of  many  of  the  texts  of  Handel's 
oratorios,  and  diligently  turn  it  into  rhymed  Ger- 
man, is  a  good  earnest  of  the  strength  of  his  enthu- 
siasm. The  most  prominent  Bachite  was  Philipp 
Spitta,  a  schoolmaster  in  Eisenach.  As  Chry- 
sander  had  the  peculiar  failing  of  not  being  able  to 
keep  himself  from  defaming  Bach,  Spitta  could 
never  be  dissuaded  from  indulging  in  similar  flings 
at  Handel ;  so  the  two  men  were  continually  at 


BACH'S   AND   HANDEL'S   SCORES  109 

swords'  (or  pens')  points.  Their  animosity  reached 
its  climax  when  Spitta  came  to  Leipzig,  a  few  years 
ago,  to  deliver  a  course  of  lectures  on  Bach.  How 
long  this  state  of  affairs  might  have  lasted,  had 
not  a  third  element  been  introduced  into  the  dis- 
cussion, were  hard  to  tell.  But  a  third  element 
was  very  soon  introduced  in  the  person  of  Robert 
Franz. 

Franz  had,  for  some  time  past,  been  attracting 
considerable  attention  by  his  additional  accompani- 
ments to  several  scores  of  Bach,  Handel,  Durante, 
and  Astorga.  Now  Chrysander  rather  felt  as  if  he 
himself,  the  noted  biographer  of  Handel,  and  one 
of  the  most  influential  members  of  the  Handel 
Society,  had,  or  ought  to  have,  something  like  a 
monopoly  of  knowledge  on  the  subject  of  filling 
out  Handel's  continuos  ;  in  like  manner  Spitta  felt 
that  he,  the  biographer  of  Bach,  and  well-known 
Bach-student,  knew  all  that  was  to  be  known 
about  writing  additional  accompaniments  to  Bach's 
scores.  About  the  manner  in  which  this  was  to  be 
done  both  men  essentially  agreed,  if  in  nothing 
else.  Now  Franz  believed  that  he,  although 
neither  archaBological  pedant,  necrologist,  nor 
schoolmaster,  but  merely  a  hard  Bach  and  Handel 
student  and  a  highly  cultivated  musician  with  a 
decided  spark  of  genius,  knew  somewhat  more 
about  the  artistic  side  of  his  favourite  masters  than 


110      ADDITIONAL    ACCOMPANIMENTS  TO 

either  Chrysander  or  Spitta,  who,  with  all  their 
labour,  may  be  said  to  have  sounded  those  mighty 
heads  only  wig-deep  at  best.  He  also  showed  in 
his  work  that  he  differed  widely  with  Chrysander 
and  Spitta  on  some  very  vital  and  essential  points. 
So  he  came  in  for  a  sound  rating — through  the 
medium  of  printer's  ink — from  both  these  literary 
lights.  But  Franz,  although  naturally  the  most 
modest  and  inoffensive  mortal  alive,  was  not  the 
man  to  shirk  an  encounter  in  which  the  honour  of 
Bach  and  Handel  was  at  stake  ;  being,  moreover,  a 
man  of  no  mean  literary  ability,  he  answered  back, 
calmly  but  firmly,  and  with  such  effect  that  his 
opponents'  wrath  fairly  reached  the  boiling-over 
point.  There  was  plainly  nothing  for  it  but  to 
make  common  cause  against  the  common  enemy. 

Accordingly,  Chrysander  and  Spitta  shook 
hands,  swearing  eternal  alliance ;  Bachianer  and 
Handelianer  fused,  as  the  politicians  say.  The 
Leipziger  Bach-Verein  (Leipzig  Bach  Association) 
was  formed  on  the  most  violent  anti-Franz  prin- 
ciples. This  association  had  for  its  object  not  only 
the  editing  many  of  Bach's  choral  works  in  piano- 
forte and  vocal  score,  with  a  complete  accompani- 
ment worked  out  from  Bach's  figured  continuo, 
to  be  used  whenever  the  works  in  question  were 
performed,  but  also  the  public  performance  of 
these  works  by  the  best  choral  and   orchestral 


Ill 

forces  Leipzig  afforded.  So  the  pen-and-ink  war 
was  no  longer  between  Bachianer  and  Handelianer, 
about  which  of  the  two  was  the  greater  man, — a 
rather  foolish  bone  of  contention  at  best, — but  be- 
tween Robert  Franz  and  the  Leipzig  Bach  Asso- 
ciation, as  to  the  manner  in  which  the  necessary- 
add  itional  accompaniments  to  Bach's  and  Handel's 
vocal  scores  should  be  written. 

The  contest,  as  has  been  said,  has  by  this  time 
got  to  be  a  particularly  fierce  one,  both  parties  in- 
dulging themselves  in  personalities  and  mutual  re- 
criminations to  a  lamentable  extent,  Julius  Schaef- 
fer,  for  instance,  assuring  Dr.  Chrysander  that  his 
additional  accompaniments  u  sound  quite  as  badly 
on  the  clavichord  as  on  the  pianoforte/'  and  the 
opposite  party  hitting  back  with  even  greater 
frankness.  Be  it  said,  however,  that,  in  so  far  as 
concerns  Franz  personally,  he  has  expressed  him- 
self with  noble  moderation  in  all  he  has  written. 
The  most  notable  sympathizers  with  either  party 
are,  on  the  Franz  side,  Julius  Schaeffer  (who  may 
be  regarded  as  Franz's  semi-official  mouthpiece), 
Joseph  Eheinberger,  and  Franz  Liszt ;  on  the 
side  of  the  Bach  Association,  Johannes  Brahms, 
Joseph  Joachim,  and  several  others.  The  Bach 
Association  represents  the  conservative,  archaeo- 
logico-historical  element,  Franz  the  progressive,  ar- 
tistic one.     There  seems  to  exist  a  considerable  di- 


112      ADDITIONAL  ACCOMPANIMENTS   TO 

yergence  of  opinion  on  many  points  among  some 
of  the  influential  members  of  the  Bach  Association 
itself;  one  of  them,  Franz  Wiillner,  may  be  re- 
garded as  to  all  intents  and  purposes  a  sympa- 
thizer with  Robert  Franz.  In  his  additional  ac- 
companiments to  the  cantata,  Jesu,  der  du  meine 
Seele,  he  has  followed  Franz's  method  in  many  es- 
sential points.  How  it  happens  that  the  Bach  As- 
sociation could  allow  this  arrangement  to  be  em- 
bodied in  its  edition  is  not  quite  clear.  There  are 
also  many  prominent  musicians  who  sympathize 
wholly  with  Franz,  but  take  no  active  part  in  the 
controversy.  The  first  publication  of  the  Bach  As- 
sociation appeared  in  1876.  It  comprised  the  can- 
tatas Sie  werden  aus  Saba  Alle  kommen,  arranged 
by  A.  Volkland ;  Wer  Dank  opfert,  der  preiset 
mich,  arranged  by  H.  von  Herzogenberg  ;  and  Jesu, 
der  du  meine  Seele,  arranged  by  Franz  Wiillner. 

Having  thus  seen  how  the  famous  Bach  and 
Handel  controversy  arose,  it  is  now  time  for  us  to 
examine  into  its  merits. 

The  question  of  how  additional  accompaniments 
to  Bach's  and  Handel's  scores  are  to  be  written  is 
really  a  double  one.  The  first  and  more  important 
is,  in  what  style  the  filling-out  of  the  figured  (or 
unfigured)  continuo  is  to  be  done  ;  the  second,  less 
important  one,  on  what  instrument,  or  instruments, 
the  added  parts  are  to  be  played.     This  second 


bach's  and  handel's  scores       113 

question  seems  of  easy  solution  at  first  sight ;  the 
almost  universally  accepted  tradition  being  that 
the  composers  themselves  used  the  organ,  in  some 
cases  the  harpsichord  or  clavichord.  But  there  is 
some  difficulty  in  the  matter,  notwithstanding. 

The  majority  of  HandeFs  vocal  works  are  either 
concert  compositions  or  else  operas,  which  the  enor- 
mous change  in  the  art  of  dramatic  writing  since 
his  time  has  driven  from  the  stage,  and  our  modern 
taste  can  find  acceptable  only  in  the  concert-room. 
Bach  wrote  mainly  for  the  Church  ;  but  the  altered 
fashions  of  our  day  make  the  availableness  of  his 
Church-cantatas  for  purposes  of  divine  worship  very 
questionable ;  at  all  events,  they  could  be  used  only 
in  the  German  Lutheran  service.  Bach's  oratorios 
and  cantatas  come  to-day  as  much  within  the  do- 
main of  the  concert-room  as  HandeFs  vocal  works. 
Now,  the  number  of  concert-halls  in  the  world  that 
possess  an  organ  is  exceedingly  limited,1  so  that 
the  enforced  use  of  an  organ  in  these  scores  would 
shut  the  doors  of  many  choral  societies  upon  them 
at  once.  But  more  of  this  further  on.  Let  us 
first  consider  the  more  important  and  vital  ques- 
tion— How  is  the  figured  continuo  to  be  worked 
out  ? 

There  are  many  opinions  on  the  subject ;  but 
that  something  needs  to  be  done,  even  in  those 

1  This  was  more  true  in  18T8  than  it  is  now. 
8 


114      ADDITIONAL   ACCOMPANIMENTS   TO 

scores  where  there  is  no  figuring  under  the  conti- 
nuo,  is  agreed  by  every  one.  Bach  and  Handel 
never  showed  the  faintest  symptoms  of  deeming  a 
melody  and  bass  all  that  was  needful  in  music. 
Jean-Jacques  Kousseau  advocated  this  strange  the- 
ory, saying  that  the  truly  aesthetic  ear  takes  more 
pleasure  in  divining  the  harmony  in  a  composition 
than  in  actually  hearing  it ;  but  Bach  and  Handel 
had  minds  of  another  stamp. 

Some  persons  are  of  the  opinion  that,  in  working 
out  these  masters'  figured  (or  unfigured)  basses, 
"the  greatest  possible  neutrality  in  the  filling- 
out  "  should  be  observed ;  in  other  words,  the  ad- 
ditions should  be  as  inconspicuous  as  possible. 
These  are  the  archaeological  extremists.  Others 
have  felt  less  scruples,  saying  that  one  need  only 
have  a  clear  insight  into  the  A  B  0  of  the  matter 
(that  is,  of  writing  harmony  to  a  figured  bass,  or, 
as  it  was  called  in  Handel's  time, — mark  the  expres- 
sion,— the  art  of  accompanying)  to  do  all  that  is 
required  in  any  case;  that  every  musician,  even 
tolerably  skilful  amateurs,  can  not  fail  to  find  the 
right  path  and  walk  securely  therein. 

What  the  "  greatest  possible  neutrality  "  in  the 
filling-out  means  is  not  hard  to  guess.  It  evi- 
dently means  that  the  figured  continuo  should  be 
filled  out  in  plain  harmony — what  the  French  call 
accords  plaqufe.     Now  one  thing  is  clear  :  if  this 


BACH'S   AND   HANDEL'S   SCORES  115 

added  harmony  is  to  be  "  neutral,"  it  must  be 
neither  actively  consonant  nor  discrepant  with  the 
spirit  of  the  original  parts,  instrumental  or  vocal, 
written  by  the  composer ;  it  must  neither  help  nor 
hinder  them ;  it  must  have  no  individuality  of  its 
own  ;  in  short,  it  must  be  a  sort  of  musical  tertium 
quid,  not  very  easy  to  define.  It  is  a  little  strange, 
however,  that  we  may  look  through  all  Bach's  and 
Handel's  vocal  works  without  finding  an  instance 
of  their  having  treated  a  single  item  in  their  com- 
positions as  "neutral."  On  the  contrary,  every 
voice,  every  orchestral  part,  is  instinct  with  life, 
every  instrument  has  something  to  say.  It  may 
be  retorted  with  some  show  of  speciousness  that, 
admitting  this  musical  vitality  to  be  found  in 
everything  Bach  and  Handel  actually  wrote  out, 
there  is  no  direct  evidence  that  they  intended  their 
mere  figured  basses  to  indicate  anything  of  the 
sort ;  and  that,  if  they  had  intended  the  gaps  in 
their  scores  to  be  filled  out  in  a  polyphonic  style — 
that  is,  in  a  style  in  which  every  part  is  vitally  im- 
portant— they  would  not  have  left  the  gaps  there 
at  all,  but  would  have  filled  them  out  themselves. 
Of  direct  evidence  in  this  matter  there  is  naturally 
none,  or  the  question  could  never  have  come  up  ; 
but  the  circumstantial  and  internal  evidence  is 
very  strong. 
In  the  first  place,  the  style  of  writing  in  which 


116      ADDITIONAL  ACCOMPANIMENTS  TO 

certain  instrumental  parts  are  nsed  merely  to  form 
a  plain  harmonic  background  for  other  parts, 
treated  in  a  flowing  polyphonic  style,  is  foreign  to 
the  spirit  of  Bach's  day.  This  style  can  not  be 
traced  farther  back  than  Mozart,  Haydn,  and 
Gluck.  Bach  and  Handel  may  be  said  to  have 
lived  in  an  essentially  polyphonic  age  ;  in  a  time 
when  all  that  was  not  structurally  essential  in 
music  was  looked  upon  as  superfluous,  and  hence 
inadmissible.  To  understand  why  they  should 
have  been  content  merely  to  indicate  certain 
things  in  their  scores,  and  in  a  way  open  to  great 
latitude  of  interpretation,  too,  we  must  under- 
stand something  of  the  musical  habits  and  cus- 
toms of  their  day.  At  that  period  the  "art  of 
accompanying "  did  not  mean  the  art  of  playing 
or  conducting  an  already  elaborated  instrumental 
accompaniment  to  one  or  more  singers  or  solo- 
players;  it  meant  the  art  of  deciphering — either 
at  sight,  or  after  some  practice — a  figured  bass  on 
the  organ  or  harpsichord.  This  art  was  very  ge- 
nerally cultivated,  and  no  one  was  considered  a  com- 
petent organist  or  clavecinist  who  had  not  attained 
to  a  high  degree  of  proficiency  in  it.  More  than 
this,  an  organist  was  expected  to  be  able  not  only  to 
decipher  a  figured  bass  correctly  and  freely  at  sight, 
but  to  improvise  contrapuntally  on  a  given  theme. 
A  significant  fact  in  this  connection  is  that  we 


bach's  and  handel's  scores       117 

find  that  certain  famous  singers  in  London  stipu- 
lated especially,  in  their  contracts  with  managers, 
"that  Mr.  Handel  should  play  the  accompani- 
ments;" that  is,  that  he  should  preside  at  the 
harpsichord  or  organ,  and  decipher  the  figured 
continuo.  Now  it  is  hardly  likely  that,  at  a  time 
when  there  were  so  many  instrumental  virtuosi  in 
London,  such  stress  should  have  been  laid  on 
HandePs  accompanying,  if  it  had  been  only  a 
question  of  keyboard  technique.  No,  it  was  be- 
cause Handel  filled  out  a  figured  bass  better  than 
other  artists.  Had  this  filling-out  to  be  done 
merely  in  correct  plain  harmony  (accords  plaques) 
there  would  have  been  but  a  small  chance  of  Han- 
del's shining  perceptibly  superior  to  other  players 
at  a  time  when  the  next  best  organist  was  perfectly 
competent  to  do  as  much ;  but,  if  the  continuo 
was  to  be  worked  out  in  a  pure  polyphonic  style, 
in  imitative  counterpoint,  we  see  at  once  how 
Handel  might  easily  have  distanced  less  gifted  and 
experienced  virtuosi  than  himself.  Indeed,  it  is 
reported  that  to  hear  Handel  or  Bach  play  from 
a  figured  bass  was  like  listening  to  a  brilliant  or- 
gan concerto. 

In  the  next  place,  we  find  by  experiment  that  in 
very  many  cases  the  effect  of  mere  plain  harmony 
(accords  plaques)  in  conjunction  with  the  parts 
actually  written  out  by  Bach  and  Handel  is  un- 


118      ADDITIONAL   ACCOMPANIMENTS  TO 

satisfactory,  if  not  downright  bad.  The  contrast 
between  Bach's  and  Handel's  freely  moving  parts, 
so  full  of  glorious  life  and  vigour,  and  the  heavy, 
sluggish  chords  is  too  marked  ;  the  "  accompani- 
ment *  hangs  like  a  millstone  round  the  neck  of 
the  brilliant  counterpoint,  or  else  so  muffles  and 
chokes  it  that  it  loses  half  its  charm.  It  is  like 
filling  out  the  space  between  the  beautiful  head 
and  limbs  of  some  fragmentary  antique  statue 
with  mere  shapeless  ashlar ;  the  head  and  limbs  do 
better  without  it.  There  are  even  passages  which 
absolutely  defy  simple  harmonic  treatment.  Take, 
for  example,  the  following  measure  from  the  bass 
air  in  Bach's  cantata,  Sie  werden  aus  Saba  Alle 
hommen : 


Bass  Solo. 


Continuo. 


Try  to  fill  out  the  accompaniment  in  plain 
chords,  and  see  what  the  effect  will  be.  Franz 
evidently  felt  this  difficulty  when  he  wrote  it  out 
as  seen  on  following  page. 

Were  it  worth  while,  I  might  also  quote  the 
Bach  Association  version  of  this  measure,  which 


Bass  Solo. 


bach's  and  handel's  scores      119 


Organ.1 


Continuo.  g 


Schaeffer  has  very  justly  characterized  as  sheer 
harmonic  nonsense. 

Franz  is  clearly  right  when  he  says  that  the 
"greatest  possible  neutrality"  in  the  filling-out 
must  necessarily  lead  to  a  want  of  character.  A 
mere  harmonic  u  accompaniment "  will  be  irk- 
somely conspicuous  by  reason  of  its  very  neutra- 
lity. Even  the  Bach  Association  has  found  it  im- 
possible to  adhere  exclusively  to  this  principle, 
and  the  coworkers  of  the  Handel  Society  have 
found  its  unstinted  application  equally  out  of  the 
question.  A  vital  polyphonic  style  is  requisite, 
and  through  it  alone  can  the  gaps  in  Bach's  and 
Handel's  scores  be  so  filled  out  that  the  contrast 

i  Two  manuals  and  pedal,  with  contrasted  stops  in  the  manuals. 


120     ADDITIONAL  ACCOMPANIMENTS  TO 

between  the  original  parts  and  the  additional  ac- 
companiments shall  not  strike  the  ear  as  ungrace- 
ful and  unmusical. 

The  truth  of  this  was  most  clearly  perceived  by 
the  greatest,  and  virtually  the  first,  musician  who 
tried  his  hand  at  filling  out  an  incomplete  score  ; 
a  man  whose  name  carries  such  weight  with  it 
that  the  present  archseologico-historical  party  have 
always  carefully  omitted  it  from  their  discussions. 
I  mean  Wolfgang  Amadeus  Mozart.  In  his  time 
the  mighty  question  of  additional  accompaniments 
had  not  set  so  many  wise  and  foolish  heads  wag- 
ging as  it  has  since.  In  working  out  the  scores  of 
Handel's  Messiah  and  Alexander's  Feast,  he  had 
only  the  dictates  of  his  own  fine  musical  instinct 
to  follow.  The  style  in  which  he  completed  the 
orchestral  parts  to  the  airs,  "  0  thou,  that  tellest 
good  tidings  to  Zion,"  and  "The  people  that 
walked  in  darkness,"  is  to  be  looked  upon  as  a 
model  for  all  such  work.  It  is  curious  to  note 
how  differently  the  Leipzig  historical  party  face, 
on  the  one  hand,  a  discussion  that  deals  with  mere 
abstractions,  and,  on  the  other,  a  definite  musical 
fact — especially  when  the  latter  is  backed  up  by 
the  prestige  of  a  great  name.  In  the  former  case 
they  are  bold  as  lions  ;  in  the  latter,  Mum  *b  the 
word!  What  explanation  can  be  offered  of  the 
very  singular  fact  that,  among  the  thirty-eight 


bach's  and  handel's  scores       121 

volumes !  of  Handel's  works  already  published  by 
the  German  Handel  Society,  the  Messiah  is  not  to 
be  found  ?  Does  it  not  seem  as  though  Messrs. 
Chrysander  &  Co.  felt  that  an  accompaniment  to 
the  Messiah,  written  out  on  their  plan,  could  not 
stand  in  face  of  Mozart's  score  ;  and  that  to  em- 
body a  pianoforte  or  organ  transcription  of  Mo- 
zart's score  in  their  edition  would  be  tacitly  to 
deny  the  soundness  of  their  principles  ?  The  fact 
that  there  is  much  that  is  incomplete,  and  even 
otherwise  unsatisfactory,  in  Mozart's  score 2  is  not 
worth  a  jot,  seeing  that  in  just  those  passages 
where  Mozart  has  been  most  successful  in  making 
his  additions  blend  harmoniously  with  both  the 
letter  and  spirit  of  the  original  parts,  so  that 
both  Handel's  work  and  his  own  seem  to  have 
sprung  from  the  same  source,  in  the  two  airs  just 
mentioned  he  has  worked  out  the  continuo  in  the 
very  freest  and  most  elaborate  contrapuntal  style. 

In  so  far  as  a  clear  insight  into  the  A  B  C  of 
the  matter  is  concerned,  it  is  not  hard  to  see  that 
this  is  quite  too  flippant  a  way  of  settling  a  very 

1  Now  (1894)  seventy-five  volumes. 

■  Mozart's  MS.  of  the  Messiah  has  been  lost.  But,  since  the  present 
essay  was  written,  it  has  been  established,  almost  beyond  a  doubt,  that  a 
good  deal  in  the  additional  accompaniments  in  the  published  score  at- 
tributed to  him  came  from  some  other  hand.  The  internal  evidence  points 
strongly  this  way ;  there  are  some  passages  in  the  published  score  (take, 
for  instance,  in  the  alto  air,  "  He  was  despised")  which  no  musician  of 
Mozart's  kidney  could  have  written. 


122      ADDITIONAL  ACCOMPANIMENTS  TO 

grave  question.  Franz  holds  with  perfect  justice, 
and  it  can  not  be  said  too  often  nor  too  empha- 
tically, that  additional  accompaniments  are  quite  as 
capable  of  weakening  and  distorting  the  original 
as  of  ennobling  and  adorning  it.  Verily  the  task 
of  filling  out  Bach's  and  Handel's  vocal  scores  ad- 
equately is  not  one  to  which  the  musical  tyro,  nor 
even  the  merely  learned  contrapuntist,  can  safely 
feel  himself  equal.  To  the  modern  musician, 
brought  up  in  the  midst  of  music  of  a  post-Han- 
delian  age,  and  strongly  imbued  with  the  artistic 
tendencies  of  our  day,  it  is  the  most  difficult  task 
in  the  whole  range  of  composition.  I  say  this  cir- 
cumspectly, and  with  full  conviction.  Let  me  re- 
peat here  that,  unless  Bach's  and  Handel's  figured, 
or  unfigured,  continuos  are  adequately  worked 
out,  their  vocal  works  are  in  no  fit  condition  for 
performance  ;  let  it  be  understood  most  distinctly 
that  to  perform  such  compositions  simply  from 
the  original  parts,  and  without  additional  accom- 
paniments of  some  sort,  is  to  commit  the  greatest 
conceivable  act  of  stupid  unfaithfulness  ;  it  is  pre- 
senting the  works  of  these  masters  in  the  one  light 
which  we  may  be  positively  sure  is  totally  wrong. 

But,  to  go  on  with  our  subject.  The  fact  that 
the  entirely  free,  melodious,  and  expressive  move- 
ment of  every  part  in  the  harmony  was  one  of  the 
prime  characteristics  of  Bach's  style,  even  when 


bach's  and  handel's  scores       123 


nothing  like  f  ugued  writing  was  in  question,  seems 
to  have  escaped  the  notice  of  many  of  his  arran- 
gers. Yet  this  is  not  only  an  evidence  of  Bach's 
supreme  skill  in  polyphonic  writing,  it  is  one  of 
the  means  by  which  he  gave  expression  to  some  of 
his  finest  and  most  poetic  inspirations.  Techni- 
cally speaking,  the  bass,  with  him,  contained  the 
germ  from  which  a  composition  was  to  be  evolved, 
rather  than  that  part  which  we,  in  modern  par- 
lance, call  the  melody.  Of  all  parts  lying  above 
the  bass,  the  "  melody  "  was,  at  best,  primus  inter 
pares.  In  his  vocal  works,  where  the  music  na- 
turally strives  to  express  the  sentiment  of  the  text, 
we  often  find  that  the  poetic  and  expressive  essence 
of  the  music  lies  in  the  middle  parts  (alto  or  tenor), 
or  in  the  orchestral  portion.  This  is  peculiarly 
noteworthy  in  his  chorals,  where  the  middle  voices 
move  with  the  most  absolute  freedom,  and  nothing 
of  that  timidly  restricted  leading  of  the  parts  ad- 
vocated in  elementary  manuals  of  harmony  is  to  be 
found.  Take,  for  instance,  the  following  passages 
in  the  choral,  "  0  Haupt  voll  Blut  und  Wunden  : " 


I    'I     I     1 

voll  Schmerz  und  vollerHohn.    O  Haupt  sdnstschongezie  -  ret, 


124     ADDITIONAL   ACCOMPANIMENTS  TO 

What  a  plenitude  of  grief  the  tenor  brings  into 
the  harmony  at  the  word  Schmerz  (grief)  !  "What 
can  be  more  expressive  of  mental  anguish  than 
the  suspended  E  in  the  tenor,  making,  as  it  does, 
the  grating  dissonance  of  the  minor  2nd  with  the 
upper  voice  ?  In  the  next  phrase,  "  0  Head,  once 
beautifully  adorned,"  the  wondrous  glow  of  light, 
shining  like  a  halo  round  the  divine  head,  at  the 
word  gezieret,  is  due  wholly  to  the  leading  of  the 
alto  and  tenor  voices.  Again  in  the  choral,  "  Ich 
bin's,  ich  sollte  biissen  "  (the  melody  of  which  is 
commonly  known  as  "  Nun  ruhen  alle  W alder  "), 
where  the  last  two  verses  are :  "  The  scourging 
and  the  bonds  Thou  hast  undergone,  them  has  my 
soul  deserved,"  with  what  loving,  sorrowful  pe- 
nitence is  the  tenor  voice  instinct  in  the  last  line  ! 


r  'cr 


j   J   J 


das      hat     ver  -  die  - 

J.    J1J5 


Bf 


m 


3 


net      mei  -  ne 


Seel'. 


I^J 


Franz  has  given  abundant  proof  of  his  thorough 
appreciation  of  this  characteristic  of  Bach's  style. 
Of  his  skill  in  reproducing  such  effects — effects  is 
an  unpleasant  word,  but  let  it  pass — the  following 
passage  from  his  arrangement  of  the  #a£a-cantata 


bach's  and  handel's  scores       125 

is  a  fine  example.  The  words  are  :  "  So  accept  it 
(i.  e.  my  heart)  graciously,  since  I  can  bring  no- 
thing nobler.  * 


Bass  Solo. 


Accomp't.  < 


so  nimm   es      gna  -  dig     an 

:  ■ 


weil 


IS 


§ 


j 


m 


Here  Franz  had  only  the  voice-part  and  the  bass 
(this  time  nnfignred)  to  work  from ;  but  what  an 
admirable  piece  of  work  he  has  made  of  it !  It 
sounds  as  if  Bach  himself  had  written  it.  How 
joyfully  the  accompaniment  soars  up  at  "  accept  it 
graciously,"  and  how  humbly  it  bows  down  to  pre- 
pare for  the  words  "since  I  can  bring  nothing 
nobler  ! "    How  full  of  reposeful  trust  in  the  ac- 


126     ADDITIONAL  ACCOMPANIMENTS  TO 

ceptance  of  the  offering  is  the  descending  closing 
cadence ! 

I  have  hinted  that  the  Bach  Association  ar- 
rangers, and  some  others,  too,  had  sounded  Bach's 
head  only  wig-deep ;  as  for  diving  down  to  the 
great,  bounteously  loving  heart  of  him,  so  full  of 
tender  piety  and  childlike  trust,  that  seems  to  have 
lain  as  far  as  possible  from  their  thoughts.  See, 
for  instance,  what  A.  Volkland  makes  of  the  pas- 
sage last  quoted  from  the  ###a-cantata,  and  com- 
pare his  version  with  Franz's  : 


Bass  Solo. 


Aecomp't. 


so    nimm     es       gna  -  dig     an, 


hT 


m 


to- 
i 


m 


well 


F^g 


F^£ 


mz 


ich  nichts  Ed 


lers  bring  -  en  kann. 


^F 


3t5fc 


m 


_ 


i 


Try 


Compared  with  Franz's  free,  buoyant  leading  of 
the  parts,  how  timidly  and  awkwardly  the  upper 


bach's  and  handel's  scores      127 

voice  in  Volkland's  accompaniment  moves  about 
within  the  close  limits  of  a  minor  3rd  ;  and  that 
diminished  7th  chord  on  C-sharp  in  the  first 
measure, — it  sounds  as  if  the  suppliant  were  per- 
forming some  painful  surgical  operation  upon  his 
heart,  or  else  invoking  the  powers  of  darkness, — 
how  its  melo-dramatic  strenuousness  contrasts  with 
the  quieter  dignity  of  Franz's  6-5  chord,  not  to 
speak  of  the  cross-relation  Volkland's  B-flat  makes 
with  the  immediately  preceding  B-natural  in 
Bach's  voice-part !  And,  upon  the  whole,  do  not 
the  two  arrangements  differ  from  each  other  as  the 
work  of  the  complete  artist  does  from  that  of  the 
bungler  ? 

Concerning  the  mere  grammatical  errors  (ScJiul- 
feliler),  such  as  rank  5ths  and  octaves,  hideous 
harmonic  progressions,  and  what  not,  made  by  men 
of  no  mean  repute  as  musicians,  in  filling  out 
Bach's  and  Handel's  continuos,  things  that  would 
expose  any  pupil  in  a  harmony  class  to  summary 
correction,  I  can  only  refer  the  reader  to  the  thirty- 
second  volume  of  the  Handel  Society,  containing 
the  famous  Italian  Chamber  Duets  and  Trios,  with 
accompaniments  worked  out  by  Johannes  Brahms 
and  Joseph  Joachim,  and  to  the  Bach  Association 
edition  of  the  cantata  Wer  Bank  opfert,  der 
preiset  mich,1  with  the  accompaniment  arranged 

1  Published  by  Rieter-Biedermann :  Leipzig  and  Winterthur,  1876. 


128      ADDITIONAL   ACCOMPANIMENTS   TO 

by  H.  von  Herzogenberg.  Both  of  these  publica- 
tions give  one  ample  food  for  serious  meditation  on 
the  condition  of  the  Art  of  Music  at  the  present 
day. 

Having  discussed  the  manner  in  which  additional 
accompaniments  to  Bach's  and  HandeFs  scores  are 
to  be  written,  the  next  question  is,  on  what  instru- 
ment, or  instruments,  are  they  to  be  played  ?  Dif- 
ficult of  solution  as  the  first  question  was,  this  one 
is  still  more  so  ;  indeed,  it  has  not  yet  been  solved 
to  the  complete  satisfaction  of  any  one. 

If  we  look  at  the  matter  from  a  purely  historical 
point  of  view,  the  fact  stares  us  in  the  face  that, 
in  all  probability,  Bach  and  Handel  themselves  used 
the  organ  and  harpsichord  (or  clavichord).  So  far 
as  the  latter  instruments  are  concerned,  the  tone  of 
the  pianoforte  (the  modern  substitute  for  the  harp- 
sichord or  clavichord),  in  combination  with  the  or- 
chestra, the  contrast  between  its  cold,  quasi-stac- 
cato  notes  and  the  warm  sustained  tones  of  the  voices 
and  other  instruments,  is  peculiarly  ungrateful  to 
the  modern  ear ;  so  much  so  that  anything  more 
than  a  very  sparing  use  of  it  is  to  be  deprecated. 
For  let  us  not  lose  sight  of  the  fact  that,  in  filling 
out  old  scores,  the  chief  desideratum  is  to  preserve 
the  spirit  of  the  original  works,  which  is  in  ge- 
neral far  more  dependent  upon  purity  of  musical 
outline  than  upon  mere  effects  of  clang-tint.     In 


bach's  and  handel's  scores       129 

this  particular  Bach's  and  Handel's  works  differ 
diametrically  from  the  greater  part  of  the  music 
of  the  present  day,  which  is  to  an  overweening 
extent  dependent  on  the  sheer  physical  (what 
Hanslick  calls  the  pathological)  effect  of  strongly 
contrasted,  harsh,  mellow,  powerful,  or  sensuous 
qualities  of  sound.  If  archaeological  accuracy 
were  the  sole  object  in  view,  the  pianoforte,  or  even 
the  old  harpsichord  or  spinet,  might  certainly  be 
largely  employed  for  purposes  of  accompaniment ; 
but  this  would  result  in  many  cases  in  a  mere 
quaintness  of  sonority  (to  our  ears)  utterly  at  va- 
riance with  the  intent  of  the  music.  What  we 
should  have  most  at  heart  is  to  enable  the  music  to 
produce,  as  far  as  practicable,  the  same  effect  upon 
our  organization  that  it  did  upon  the  listener  of 
the  day  when  it  was  written.  Who  would  wish  the 
broad  stripes  of  bright  paint  restored,  which  anti- 
quaries tell  us  once  adorned  the  ^Egina  marbles  ? 
What  aesthetic  end  would  be  gained  thereby  ?  The 
use  of  the  pianoforte  in  Bach  and  Handel  scores 
would  be -a  piece  of  historical  accuracy  of  much 
the  same  artistic  value. 

As  for  the  use  of  the  organ,  I  will  only  give 
some  significant  facts.  The  historical  party  are 
naturally  in  favour  of  the  organ,  and  of  the  organ 
only,  in  cases  where  the  clavichord  is  not  to  be 
used;  their  claim  to  the  title  of  historical  party 
9 


130      ADDITIONAL  ACCOMPANIMENTS  TO 

rests  mainly  on  this  preference.  That  Bach  and 
Handel  nsed  the  organ  is  not  to  be  questioned ; 
but  where,  when,  how,  and  how  mnch  they  nsed  it 
is  by  no  means  so  certain.  In  Bach's  case  it  is  not 
even  certain  why  he  used  it ;  that  is,  whether  he 
used  it  wholly  from  preference,  or  in  part  from  ne- 
cessity. Bach  wrote  his  Church-cantatas  at  very 
short  intervals,  often  one  a  week,  and  copied  out 
many  of  the  parts  himself.  It  is  easily  conceivable 
that  he  may  often  have  been  hard-pressed  for  time, 
and  took  to  the  makeshift  of  a  figured  bass,  to  be 
filled  out  by  himself  at  the  organ,  simply  to  save 
time.  His  well-known  lack  of  proper  orchestral  re- 
sources may  have  been  an  additional  reason.  The 
following  quotation  from  the  preface  to  the  first  vo- 
lume of  the  Bach  Society  throws  some  light  upon 
this  matter. 

"While  Handel  brought  out  his  sacred  compositions  by 
means  of  elaborate  concert  performances,  with  the  best- 
drilled  executants,  in  a  metropolis  where  a  numerous  pub- 
lic was  interested  to  pass  judgment  upon  them,  S.  Bach  l 
wrote  solely  for  the  church-service,  and  had  at  his  disposal 
but  very  limited  means  of  performing  his  music  for  Sun- 
days and  holy-days.  Judging  from  what  we  know  of  the 
demands  made  by  Bach  on  his  executants,  the  performance 
can  not  always  have  been  an  euphonious  one,  much  less  such 
an  one  as  could  reveal  all  the  intrinsic  wealth  of  the  compo- 
sition.    Even  if  the   choir,   well  trained  to  sing  with  pre- 

1  Bach  is  commonly  known  in  Germany  by  his  middle  name,  Sebastian. 


bach's  and  handel's  scores      131 

cision,  was  fully  equal  to  its  task,  it  is  hard  to  believe  that 
the  solo  singers  could  have  been  equally  competent  to 
grapple  with  S.  Bach's  airs — those  airs,  of  which  the  peculiar 
and  not  always  convenient  vocal  style  is  to  be  mastered  and 
rendered  with  musical  freedom  only  by  finished  artists. 
.  .  .  Among  his  MS.  parts  for  strings  and  chorus  we 
never  find  more  than  a  single  copy  for  each  voice  or  instru- 
ment ;  the  chorus-parts  also  contain  the  solo  passages  for 
their  respective  voices.  From  this  fact  alone  might  be  con- 
cluded that  both  stringed  instruments  and  chorus  singers  at 
these  performances  were  very  few  in  number  ;  and  a  MS. 
letter  of  Bach's,  still  preserved  in  the  archives  of  the  Leip- 
zig common  council,  containing  complaints  of  the  inade- 
quate means  offered  him  for  performing  his  church  music, 
together  with  an  enumeration  and  description  of  the  same, 
leaves  no  room  for  further  doubt  on  this  head." 

Another  fact  to  the  point  is  that,  in  Bach's  and 
Handel's  day,  such  a  functionary  as  a  conductor, 
beating  time  with  a  baton,  was  unknown.  The 
organist  led  the  performance,  as  he  still  does  in 
our  church  choirs.  In  Philipp  Emanuel  Bach's 
treatise  on  the  art  of  accompanying,  we  find : 

"The  organ  is  indispensable  in  church  matters,  on  ac- 
count of  the  fugues,  the  loud  choruses,  and  in  general  for 
the  sake  of  establishing  a  firm  connection"  {i.e.,  between 
the  various  voices  and  instruments).  "It  increases  the 
splendour  and  preserves  order." 

Now,  it  is  one  thing  to  use  the  organ  as  a  rein- 
forcing agent,  to  strengthen  certain  vocal  or  in- 


132     ADDITIONAL  ACCOMPANIMENTS  TO 

strumental  parts,  and  thus  add  power  to  the  vo- 
lume of  sound  ;  but  quite  another  thing,  to  use  it 
as  an  independent  element  in  a  composition.  On 
the  use  of  the  organ  in  combination  with  the  or- 
chestra, the  following  opinion  of  Berlioz  (who 
may  be  considered  high  authority  in  all  matters 
connected  with  the  effect  of  combinations  of  dif- 
ferent qualities  of  sound)  is  of  value.     He  says  : 

"We  must  recognize  the  fact  that  its"  (the  organ's) 
"even,  equal,  uniform  sonority  never  blends  perfectly  with 
the  variously  characterized  voices  of  the  orchestra,  and  that 
there  seems  to  exist  a  secret  antipathy  between  these  two 
musical  powers.  The  organ  and  the  orchestra  are  both 
kings — or  rather,  the  one  is  emperor  and  the  other,  pope  ; 
their  interests  are  too  vast  and  too  divergent  to  be  con- 
founded. Thus,  on  nearly  all  occasions  when  this  singular 
combination  has  been  tried,  either  the  organ  has  proudly 
domineered  over  the  orchestra,  or  else  the  orchestra,  forced 
to  an  immoderate  pitch  of  energy,  has  well-nigh  extin- 
guished its  adversary." 

The  intrinsic  incompatibility  of  the  organ  with 
the  orchestra  is  peculiarly  to  be  felt  in  the  accom- 
paniment of  airs,  and  concerted  music  for  solo 
voices,  where  there  can  surely  be  no  question  of 
reinforcing  weak  parts.  Of  course,  in  such  cases, 
only  the  softer  stops  can  come  into  play ;  and  just 
these  stops  so  greatly  lack  decision  of  utterance 
and  accent,  that  their  contrast  with  the  orchestral 


BACH'S  AND   HANDEL'S  SCORES         133 

instruments  is  peculiarly  unfavourable  to  the 
equally  balanced  effect  of  polyphonic  writing  — 
doubly  so  when  the  tempo  is  at  all  rapid.  In  the 
concert-room,  moreover,  both  organist  and  organ- 
pipes  are  at  sach  a  distance  from  the  singer  and 
the  accompanying  instruments  in  the  orchestra, 
that  anything  like  a  sympathetic  performance  is 
rendered  well-nigh  impracticable.  There  is  good 
historical  evidence  to  support  the  belief,  enter- 
tained by  many  persons,  that  Bach  accompanied 
many  of  the  airs  in  his  works  on  a  RihcJcpositiv,1 
or  a  Regal,2  placed  directly  by  the  singer's  side. 

Franz  has  suggested  supplying  the  place  of  an 
organ,  in  cases  where  that  instrument  is  not  to 
be  used  as  a  reinforcing  agent,  by  a  quartet  of 
two  clarinets  and  two  bassoons ;  in  some  cases  by 
the  stringed  instruments  in  the  orchestra.  This 
quartet  of  reed  instruments  has  much  the  quality 
of  tone  of  certain  registers  of  the  organ,  and  has 
the  advantage  of  a  far  greater  power  of  accent  and 
superior  dynamic  variety.  These  instruments,  to- 
gether with  a  'cello  and  double-bass  (for  the  con- 
tinue), are  to  be  placed  close  behind  the  singer, 
and  consequently  directly  under  the  conductor's 
eye. 

1  Ruckpositiv  (Ger.)  a  back  choir  organ ;  that  is,  a  choir  organ  which 
is  behind  the  player,  the  connecting  mechanism  of  which  passes  under 
his  feet.    (Stainer  &  Barrett's  Dictionary  of  Musical  Terms.) 

1  The  Regal  was  a  small  portable  organ. 


134     ADDITIONAL  ACCOMPANIMENTS  TO 

This  arrangement  has  proved  eminently  success- 
ful in  many  instances  ;  in  others  it  is  not  quite  so 
satisfactory.  The  union  of  the  second  bassoon 
with  the  'cello  and  double-bass,  especially  when 
the  part  runs  low,  sometimes  sounds  thick  and 
muddy.  This  defect  might  be  cured  by  omitting 
the  second  bassoon  part  in  such  passages  (as  Franz 
himself  has  suggested)  ;  it  is  noteworthy  that  Mo- 
zart has  in  no  instance  doubled  the  continuo  with 
any  of  his  additional  parts.  At  all  events,  it  is 
well  known  that  neither  Bach  nor  Handel  were 
at  all  averse  to  a  very  solid  bass  in  their  works  ; 
the  number  of  instruments  the  latter  sometimes 
crowded  together  upon  his  bass  is  simply  surpri- 
sing, according  to  our  modern  notions. 

And  even  if  Franz  has  not  been  wholly  success- 
ful in  some  passages — for  his  surpassing  mastery 
in  counterpoint  and  his  fine  musical  instinct  have 
nothing  whatever  to  do  with  his  possible  lack  of 
skill  in  orchestration  —  he,  and  notably  Mozart, 
have  been  so  thoroughly  successful  in  many  of 
their  arrangements  of  Bach  and  Handel  scores  for 
orchestra,  without  organ,  that  the  possibility  of  its 
being  well  and  satisfactorily  done  has  been  con- 
vincingly demonstrated.  But,  upon  the  whole,  this 
subject  has  not  yet  been  made  clear  by  sufficiently 
exhaustive  experiments,  and  no  one  can  have  come 
to  a  rational  final  conclusion  about  every  case. 


BACH'S  AND  HANDEL'S  SCORES         135 

It  must,  however,  not  be  forgotten  that  this 
question  is,  after  all,  of  secondary  importance. 
Whether  a  musical  phrase  be  played  on  an  organ 
or  on  a  clarinet,  it  still  remains  one  and  the  same 
phrase.  Whatever  opinion  one  may  hold  of  the 
condition  of  the  art  of  instrumentation  per  se  in 
Bach's  and  Handel's  day,  it  must  be  fully  evident 
to  any  one  who  takes  the  trouble  to  study  these 
masters'  scores,  that  instrumentation  was  a  far  less 
integral  and  important  element  in  the  art  of  com- 
position then  than  it  has  become  since.  The  prime 
question  in  this  matter  is  :  What  shall  be  played  ? 
not,  On  what  instruments  shall  it  be  played  f 


GIACOMO  MEYERBEER 


GIACOMO  MEYERBEER 

If  the  ardent  Gluckists  and  Piccinnists,  quarrel- 
ling over  their  wine  and  coffee  in  the  Cafe  de  la 
Kotonde,  with  the  busts  of  the  two  composers 
looking  coolly  down  upon  them,  as  they  exchanged 
their  shots  of  "  statue  and  pedestal/'  "  orchestra 
and  stage,"  and  mutually  lashed  themselves  up  to 
the  frenzied  pitch  in  the  heat  of  argument,  could 
but  suddenly  have  foreseen  to  what  lengths  the 
principles  they  discussed  would  be  carried  in  after- 
times,  dumb  astonishment  might  well  have  put  a 
momentary  stop  to  their  excited  bickerings.  Ima- 
gine the  dismay  of  the  disembodied  spirit  of  some 
Gluckist — or  even  of  the  good  Christoph  Willibald 
himself — returned  to  earth  and  the  Academie  de 
Musique,  at  witnessing  a  modern  French  grand 
opera  by  Meyerbeer;  or,  if  perchance  it  should 
travel  as  far  as  Bayreuth,  at  opening  its  long-closed 
eyes  on  Wagner's  Nibelungen,  and  being  told  that 
the  extraordinary  works  that  met  its  gaze  and 
sounded  so  strangely  in  its  bewildered  ears  were 
the  latest  outgrowths  of  the  Gluck  opera !    Con- 


140  GIACOMO   MEYERBEER 

ceive  the  astonishment  of  a  Piccinnist  ghost  at 
finding  its  idol's  lightly-warbling  mnse  decked  out 
in  the  flaunting  trappings  of  Rossini's  Si'ege  de 
Corinthe  ! 

Yet  so  do  things  grow  in  this  world.  One  man 
sows  the  seeds  of  dramatic  truthfulness  on  the 
lyric  stage,  a  generation  or  two  spring  up  and  pass 
away,  and  his  successor  reaps  unheard-of  and  un- 
imagined  crops  of  dramatic  effect.  Another  man 
pins  his  faith  to  the  independence  of  music  in 
opera,  and  is  soon  enough  followed  by  another 
still,  who  raises  music  up  upon  the  throne  of  abso- 
lute autocracy. 

With  regard  to  the  Rossini  outgrowth  of  the 
Piccinni  principle,  little  or  nothing  need  be  said 
now.  Rossini  is  hardly  cold  in  his  grave,  and 
where  are  his  operas  ?  Most  of  those  works,  so 
full  of  exquisite  music,  so  instinct  with  genius, 
which  but  a  generation  ago  intoxicated  all  Europe 
and  were  the  cynosure  of  enraptured  crowds,  now 
struggle  painfully  for  a  respectful  hearing  ;  singers 
will  not  (too  often  can  not)  sing  them,  managers 
neglect  them,  the  public  has  forgotten  them  ;  their 
god-like  grace  and  beauty  lie  shrouded  in  dust  on 
library  shelves. 

But  Meyerbeer  still  lives  in  his  works,  as  vigour- 
ous  a  life  as  ever.  He  has  had  no  successor  who 
can  rightly  claim  to  wear  his  mantle.     The  name 


GIACOMO  MEYERBEER  141 

of  his  followers,  imitators,  and  hoc  servum  pecus 
is  legion  ;  but  the  Gounods,  Thomas's,  Massenets 
can  not  wield  his  sceptre.  Yet  his  example  and 
success  were  too  brilliant  not  to  tempt  to  emulation. 
Even  his  most  successful  rival,  Giuseppe  Verdi, 
could  not  refrain  from  paying  him  the  late  ho- 
mage of  imitation,  as  soon  as  death  had  called  him 
from  the  field  of  action  ;  not  content  with  the  lau- 
rels won  by  Nabucco,  Ernani,  and  Eigoletto,  the 
hot-blooded  Italian  made  his  bid  for  fresh  honours 
in  the  path  Meyerbeer  had  so  triumphantly  trod. 
Yet  from  A'ida  to  the  Huguenots  is  a  long  step  ; 
Meyerbeer  is  still  the  one  and  only  Meyerbeer. 

In  considering  a  man  whose  career  was  so 
uniquely  brilliant,  one  can  not  help  casting  about 
to  discover  wherein  the  secret  of  his  success  mainly 
lay.  He  certainly  had  many  high  qualities,  yet 
can  not  fairly  be  said  to  have  possessed  any  especial 
one  of  them  to  a  transcendent  degree.  His  na- 
tural intrinsically  musical  endowments  were  small 
compared  to  Rossini's ;  in  spontaneity  of  inspira- 
tion, in  melodic  power,  in  what  may  be  called  the 
specific  musical  sense,  he  falls  behind  the  Italian 
maestro.  As  a  contrapuntist,  in  spite  of  his  pre- 
tensions and  the  claims  made  for  him  by  his  French 
admirers,  he  has  given  nothing  to  the  world  that 
can  entitle  him  to  a  really  high  rank.     His  mas- 


142  GIACOMO  MEYERBEER 

tery  of  musical  form,  his  power  of  developing  a 
theme  into  a  finely  and  stoutly  organized  compo- 
sition of  sustained  interest,  must  be  called  slight, 
when  judged  by  any  high  standard.  His  dramatic 
power  was  great,  it  is  true;  yet  the  instances  in 
which  it  shows  itself  as  of  inherently  fine  and  pure 
quality  are  few  and  far  between.  His  gift  for 
theatrical  effect,  however,  was  indubitable,  nay, 
utterly  phenomenal. 

Possessed  of  musical  genius  and  perceptions 
which,  if  not  of  the  highest  sort,  were  still  suffi- 
ciently stout  and  keen  to  serve  as  a  basis  for  a  high 
degree  of  culture,  Meyerbeer  had  a  singularly  sharp 
eye  for  whatever  was  striking  and  saisissant,  as  the 
French  say ;  his  appreciation  of  the  effective  has 
seldom  been  paralleled.  Unremitting  work,  eager 
and  ceaseless  observation,  an  easy-going  artistic 
conscience — or  possibly  the  lack  of  absolutely  fine 
artistic  perceptions — enabled  him  to  develop  this 
power  to  the  utmost.  The  keenness  of  his  obser- 
vation of  other  composers,  the  lightning  rapidity 
with  which  he  would  take  the  slightest  hint  from 
the  works  of  other  men,  was  something  astound- 
ing. Of  plagiarism,  in  the  invidious  sense,  one 
finds  little  in  his  compositions  ;  he  had  a  very  dis- 
tinct and  unmistakable  individuality  of  his  own ; 
and,  if  we  find  him  borrowing  ideas  from  others, 
they  have  been  melted  down  in  the  crucible  of  his 


GIACOMO   MEYERBEER  143 

mind,  recast  in  a  monld  peculiar  to  himself,  and 
bear  his  own  stamp. 

For  a  man  of  his  unusual  powers  of  assimilating 
other  people's  ideas,  he  appeared  on  the  stage  just 
at  the  right  moment;  time  and  conditions  could 
not  have  been  better  chosen  for  the  advantageous 
display  of  his  peculiar  talents.  Although  what  we 
call  Meyerbeer's  third,  or  French,  manner  was 
something  quite  unprecedented  in  the  annals  of 
the  lyric  stage,  circumstances  had  combined  to 
prepare  the  public  mind  for  it ;  and,  notwith- 
standing the  astonishment  with  which  its  first 
appearance  was  greeted,  the  public  soon  found  it 
nicely  suited  to  their  wants. 

Eichard  Wagner,  in  his  figurative  way,  has  well 
described  the  conditions  under  which  Meyerbeer 
developed  his  new  style  of  dramatic  writing.  The 
account  must,  to  be  sure,  be  taken  with  a  grain  of 
salt,  but  it  is  too  good  not  to  be  given  here — with 
all  practicable  condensation.     Wagner  writes  : 

"In  the  fair  and  much-bespattered  land  of  Italy  sat 
the  carelessly  prurient  Rossini,  who,  in  his  facile,  lordly 
way,  had  tried  out  its  musical  fat  for  the  benefit  of  the 
emaciated  world  of  art,  and  now  looked  on  with  a  half-asto- 
nished smile  at  the  flounderings  of  gallant  Parisian  hunters 
after  folk-melodies.  One  of  these  was  a  good  horseman, 
and  whenever  he  dismounted  after  a  headlong  ride,  one 
might  be  sure  he  had  found  a  melody  that  would  fetch  a 
good  price.    So  he  now  rode  like  all  possessed  through  the 


144  GIACOMO  MEYERBEER 

wares  of  fish  and  costermongery  in  the  Naples  market,  ma- 
king everything  fly  about  as  in  a  whirlwind  ;  cackling  and 
curses  followed  his  course,  angry  fists  were  clenched  at  him. 
With  lightning  quickness  his  keen  nostrils  caught  the  scent 
of  a  superb  revolution  of  fishmongers  and  greengrocers. 
But  the  opportunity  was  big  with  still  further  profit !  Out 
galloped  the  Parisian  horseman  on  the  Portici  road,  to  the 
boats  and  nets  of  those  artless  singing  fishermen,  who  catch 
fish,  sleep,  rage,  play  with  wife  and  children,  hurl  dirk- 
knives,  even  knock  each  other  on  the  head,  and  all  amid 
incessant  singing.  Confess,  Master  Auber,  that  was  a  famous 
ride,  and  better  than  on  a  hippogriff,  which  only  prances 
off  into  mid-air — whence  there  is,  upon  the  whole,  nothing 
to  be  brought  home  but  colds  in  the  head  and  coughs  !  The 
horseman  rode  back  again,  dismounted,  made  Rossini  the 
politest  reverential  bow  (he  well  knew  why  !)  took  a  special 
post-chaise  for  Paris,  and  what  he  cooked  up  there  in  the 
twinkling  of  an  eye  was  nothing  less  than  the  Dumb  Girl  of 
Portici. 

11  Rossini  looked  from  afar  at  the  splendid  rowdidow,  and, 
on  his  way  to  Paris,  thought  it  profitable  to  rest  a  while  amid 
the  snowy  Alps  of  Switzerland,  and  listen  with  perked-up 
ears  to  what  musical  converse  the  nimble  lads  there  were 
wont  to  hold  with  their  mountains  and  cows.  Once  ar- 
rived in  Paris,  he  made  his  politest  bow  to  Auber  (he  well 
knew  why!),  and  with  huge  paternal  joy  presented  the 
world  with  his  youngest  born,  which,  in  a  moment  of  happy 
inspiration,  he  had  christened  William  Tdl. 

"  Thus  the  Muette  de  Portici  and  GuiUaume  Tell  became 
the  two  axes  about  which  the  whole  speculative  world  of 
opera  music  revolved. 

"  Meyerbeer  had  a  special  knack  at  observing  closely  and 


GIACOMO  MEYERBEER  145 

on  the  spot  each  successive  phenomenon  in  the  above  men- 
tioned progress  of  opera  music ;  he  dogged  its  footsteps  con- 
stantly and  everywhere.  It  is  particularly  noteworthy  that 
he  onlyfoUowed  its  lead,  hut  never  walked  side  by  side  with, 
let  alone  leading,  it.  He  was  like  the  starling,  which  fol- 
lows the  plowshare  in  the  fields,  gladly  picking  out  the 
angleworms  turned  up  in  its  furrow. 

1 '  Meyerbeer  has  not  one  single  individual  tendency  ;  but, 
by  his  eavesdropping,  he  has  always  caught  each  and  every 
word  of  his  predecessors,  and  elaborated  it  with  such  mon- 
strous ostentation,  and  withal  with  such  astounding  rapidity, 
that  he  whose  footsteps  he  was  dogging  had  hardly  uttered 
a  word  before  Meyerbeer  would  instantly  shriek  out  the  whole 
sentence,  perfectly  unconcerned  as  to  whether  he  had  un- 
derstood the  word  aright.  Hence  it  not  seldom  happened 
that  he  said  something  different  from  what  the  original 
speaker  meant  to  say.  But  Meyerbeer's  noise  was  so  deaf- 
ening that  the  first  speaker  never  got  to  the  true  expression 
of  his  own  meaning,  and  at  last  found  himself  forced  to 
chime  in  with  Meyerbeer's  phrase,  as  his  only  chance  of 
putting  in  his  word  at  all.  In  Germany  Meyerbeer  never 
succeeded  in  finding  a  phrase  that  would  in  any  way  fit 
Weber's  original  word.  What  Weber  uttered  in  such  pleni- 
tude of  melodious  life  could  not  be  reechoed  by  Meyerbeer's 
acquired,  arid  formalism.  So  at  last,  tired  of  such  fruitless 
toil,  forgetful  of  his  friend,  he  listened  only  to  Rossini's 
siren  strains,  and  migrated  to  the  land  where  those  raisins * 
grew.  He  thus  became  the  weathercock  of  music  in  Europe, 
turning  round  undecided  for  a  while  after  every  change  in 
the  wind,  and  standing  fast  only  when  its  direction  had  be* 

i  The  pun  on  Rosinen  (raisins)  and  Rossini  is  naturally  lost  in  trans- 
lation. 


146  GlACOMO  MEYERBEER 

come  well  settled.  Meyerbeer  only  wrote  operas  a  la  Rossini 
in  Italy  until  the  great  wind  had  begun  to  veer  about  in 
Paris,  and  Auber  and  Rossini  had  blown  the  new  breeze  to 
a  hurricane  with  the  Muette  and  Tell.  How  soon  was  Meyer- 
beer in  Paris !  There  he  found,  in  the  Gallicized  Weber 
(only  think  of  Robin  des  Boh  !)  ■  and  the  be-Berliozed  Beet- 
hoven, treasures  which  neither  Auber  nor  Rossini  had  no- 
ticed, as  lying  too  remote  from  their  purposes,  but  which 
Meyerbeer,  with  his  cosmopolitan  Jack-of-all-trades  eye, 
knew  very  well  how  to  value.  He  grasped  together  every- 
thing that  thus  presented  itself  into  a  wondrously  gaudy, 
motley  armful,  and  produced  something  at  whose  strident 
shriek  both  Auber  and  Rossini  suddenly  became  inaudible  : 
the  grim  devil  Robert  fetched  them  one  and  all." 

Somewhat  over-sarcastic  an  account,  and  too 
plainly  one-sided ;  but  it  throws  a  strong  electric 
light  upon  a  very  characteristic  trait  in  Meyerbeer. 
Indeed,  it  is  almost  easy  to  forgive  Wagner  the  ap- 
parently spiteful  drop  of  vinegar  with  which  he 
has  seasoned  this  figurative  sketch,  for  there  is 
something  in  Meyerbeer's  music  that  unavoidably 
ruffles  the  temper  of  any  one  who  is  inclined  to 
take  the  art  seriously.  If  we  would  admire  his 
high  qualities  unrestrictedly,  we  can  do  so  only  by 
painfully  repressing  a  sort  of  rage  into  which  his 

i  ««The  FreitcMtz,  not  in  its  native  beauty,  but  mutilated,  vulgarized, 
tortured,  and  insulted  in  a  thousand  ways  by  an  arranger— the  Freischutz 
transformed  into  Robin  des  .Bow— was  given  at  the  Od§on.  The  theatre 
filled  its  coffers,  and  M.  Castil-Blaze,  who  had  pillaged  the  masterwork, 
raked  in  over  a  hundred  thousand  francs."— Hector  Berlioz  :  Memoires. 


GIACOMO   MEYERBEER  147 

short-comings  are  too  apt  to  throw  ns.  Although 
there  are  many  pages  in  his  works  that  easily  com- 
pel enthusiastic  homage,  it  is  difficult  to  come 
away  from  a  performance  of  a  whole  opera  of  his 
in  an  entirely  agreeable  frame  of  mind ;  his  gold 
is  mixed  with  so  much  alloy,  and  the  alloy  is  often 
of  very  base  metal  indeed. 

One  of  Meyerbeer's  traits,  which  has  been  very 
loudly  admired,  is  his  power  of  writing  characteris- 
tic music,  his  skill  in  local  colouring.  This  power 
of  his  was  unquestionably  great,  yet  it  seldom 
shows  itself  as  of  really  poetic  quality.  He  could 
seize  upon  the  salient  points  of  a  situation  with 
astonishing  sureness  of  grasp,  but  he  had  little 
faculty  of  idealizing  them.  Take,  for  instance, 
the  coronation  scene  in  the  Prophete — a  situation 
of  which  ideal  use  might  well  have  been  made. 
The  ceremonial  music  in  this  scene  is  certainly  as 
gorgeous  as  could  be  wished  ;  it  is  a  fitting  musical 
expression  of  the  glittering  pomp  of  a  gala  church 
ceremony.  One  is  tempted  to  call  it  the  most 
splendid  ceremonial  music  money  could  buy.  But 
it  stops  here.  As  for  genuine  grandeur  and  im- 
pressiveness,  it  affects  the  listener  of  really  lofty 
musical  aspirations  much  as  the  rich  ceremonial 
pomp  of  a  feast-day  high  mass  in  St.  Peter's  af- 
fects a  non-Catholic  observer — as  an  overpower- 
ingly  brilliant  display.     It  is,  in  fact,  a  superb, 


148  GIACOMO  MEYERBEER 

dazzling  cathedral  ceremony,  taken  bodily  ont  of 
the  church  and  put  upon  the  stage.  But  in  the 
cathedral  all  this  theatrical  pomp  is  ennobled, 
idealized,  and  hallowed  (in  the  believer's  eyes)  by  the 
solemn  fact  that  it  is  a  divine  service,  by  the  more 
than  ever  sensible  presence  of  the  omnipotent  God ; 
on  the  stage  this  idealizing  element  falls  out  at 
once.  What  even  approximate  substitute  could 
the  composer  give  us,  save  the  intrinsically  noble 
and  elevating  character  of  his  music  ?  The  church 
ceremony  is  idealized  by  its  own  lofty  purpose ;  its 
mimic  presentation  on  the  stage  must  be  idealized 
by  the  composer.     Meyerbeer  has  not  done  it.1 

Again,  take  the  much -lauded  Pre-aux-Clercs 
scene  in  the  Huguenots.  The  music  is  certainly 
characteristic  enough.     A  man  like  Berlioz,  who 


i  To  this  may  be  replied  that  it  is  just  in  this  want  of  intrinsic  nobility 
in  the  music  that  Meyerbeer  shows  his  accurate  perception  of  the  charac- 
ter of  the  situation ;  that,  of  all  ceremonies  ever  performed  in  a  church, 
the  coronation  of  John  of  Leyden  was  the  most  hollow  and  unlovely  ; 
that  John  himself  was  a  mere  rascal,  the  three  leading  Anabaptists  little 
better  than  shrewd  theological  pot-hunters,  and  the  whole  Anabaptist 
rabble  a  set  of  bloodthirsty  fanatics.  Yet  do  we  honour  the  high-souled 
artist,  especially  the  high-souled  musician,  for  taking  a  situation  by  its 
highest,  or  its  lowest,  side  ?  Look  at  the  statue  scene  in  Mozart's  Don 
Giovanni,  where  the  Don  stands  as  the  incarnation  of  human  impiety, 
brought  to  bay  by  inexorable  fate.  Mozart  does  not  here  bring  his 
hero's  impiety  and  low  sensuality  into  the  foreground,  but  rather  his 
chivalric  courage  and  high-bred  courtliness.  And,  upon  the  whole,  when 
and  wherever  music  is  to  be  made,  should  it  not  be  the  very  best  and 
noblest  the  situation  can  possibly  warrant  ? 


GIACOMO   MEYERBEER  149 

always  had  a  keen  relish  for  local  colour,  and  was, 
upon  the  whole,  so  dazzled  by  the  brilliant  aspect 
of  Meyerbeer's  genius  that  his  finer  aesthetic  sensi- 
bilities were  abnormally  blunted  whenever  he  was 
brought  face  to  face  with  it — Berlioz  could  write 
of  this  scene  with  perfect  honesty  :  "  The  quarrel 
between  the  women,  the  litanies  of  the  Virgin,  the 
song  of  the  Huguenot  soldiers,  all  present  to  the 
ear  a  musical  tissue  of  astounding  richness,  the 
web  of  which  the  listener  can  easily  follow  without 
the  complex  thought  of  the  composer  being  blurred 
for  an  instant.  This  marvel  of  dramatized  coun- 
terpoint. .  .  ,"  etc.  Yes,  the  thing  is  writ- 
ten with  great  skill,  although  the  plan  is  not  really 
so  complicated,  with  all  its  pretentiousness,  as  a 
verbal  description  might  lead  one  to  imagine.  The 
Rataplan  is  just  such  music  as  one  can  imagine 
soldiers  singing ;  the  prayer  of  the  nuns  is  a  fair 
sample  of  much  that  is  sung  in  Catholic  convents. 
As  I  have  said,  it  is  all  as  characteristic  as  may  be, 
and  the  ensemble  effect  is  undoubtedly  striking ; 
it  has  the  salt  of  a  not  too  unfamiliar  reality. 
But,  looking  at  it  from  another  point  of  view, 
what  utterly  miserable  music  it  is  !  What  a  mere 
two-pence-ha'penny-worth  of  real  inspiration  there 
is  behind  it  all  !  The  scene  is  unidealized  from 
beginning  to  end.  The  composer  has  treated  a  by 
no  means  lofty,  yet  pregnant,  subject  in  a  purely 


150  GIACOMO  MEYERBEER 

photographic  way;  he  shows  us  no  more  in  the 
scene  than  the  vulgarest  eye  could  descry,  and 
seems  quite  content  to  be  exact,  without  a  thought 
of  being  imaginative  or  artistic  in  any  noble  sense 
of  the  word.  One  may  say  that  Meyerbeer  seldom 
took  higher  artistic  ground  than  the  barest  neces- 
sities of  the  case  in  hand  demanded. 

It  would,  however,  be  very  far  from  the  truth  to 
say  that  he  was  incapable  of  treating  exalted  sub- 
jects in  a  fitting  way.  Yet  he  needed  the  spur  of 
a  really  lofty  theme,  of  a  highly  poetic  situation,  to 
enable  him  to  rise  into  a  high  musical  atmosphere ; 
he  could  not  evolve  really  great  music  out  of  his 
own  brain  alone,  and  it  may  safely  be  said  that,  of 
his  purely  instrumental  works,  not  one  is  of  great 
value.  Of  these  latter,  his  overture  to  Struensee 
should  probably  be  given  the  first  place  ;  but  you 
would  pierce  it  clean  through  the  heart  by  compa- 
ring it  with  an  overture  by  Schumann,  Mendels- 
sohn, or  even  Weber — let  alone  Beethoven. 

It  has  been  said  that  Meyerbeer  lacked  genuine 
sentiment  and  passion.  I  think  this  is  hardly  true. 
It  were  nearer  the  truth  to  say  that  great  warmth 
of  feeling  was  not  habitual  with  him  ;  for,  in  treat- 
ing scenes  in  which  sentiment  and  passion  predo- 
minate, he  has  sometimes  risen  to  the  full  height 
of  the  situation.  I  know  of  no  music  that  glows 
with  a  more  passionate  warmth  than  some  passages 


GIACOMO  MEYERBEER  151 

in  the  great  duet  between  Valentine  and  Kaoul 
that  closes  the  fourth  act  of  Us  Huguenots.  It  is 
not  uninteresting  to  remember  that  this  wonderful 
duet,  one  of  the  greatest  in  all  opera,  was  an  after- 
thought ;  it  formed  no  part  of  the  original  scheme 
of  the  opera,  the  fourth  act  in  Scribe  and  De- 
champs's  finished  libretto  ending  with  the  famous 
"  X  minuit !  "  of  the  Benediction  of  Poniards.  It 
was  only  at  one  of  the  later  stage  rehearsals  that 
Adolphe  Nourrit,  who  took  the  part  of  Eaoul,  sug- 
gested to  Meyerbeer  that  here  would  be  a  fine  oppor- 
tunity for  a  love-scene.  Meyerbeer  jumped  at  the 
idea  immediately,  and  either  he  or  Nourrit  sketched 
out  a  plan  for  the  scene  as  soon  as  the  rehearsal 
was  over ;  this  sketch  was  forthwith  handed  over 
to  Scribe,  who  soon  wrote  the  text  for  it,  and 
Meyerbeer  was  almost  as  quick  in  composing  the 
music.  As  soon  as  the  duet  was  finished,  it  was 
put  into  rehearsal,  and  formed  part  of  the  opera  at 
the  first  performance.  Perhaps  the  spontaneity  of 
inspiration  and  passionateness  of  expression  Meyer- 
beer shows  in  this  magnificent  scene  may  be  in  part 
due  to  the,  with  him,  unusual  rapidity  of  its  con- 
ception and  execution ;  for  he  had  no  time  to  work 
it  over  and  elaborate  it,  as  was,  almost  without  ex- 
ception, his  wont. 

Even  Wagner,  whose  not  entirely  reverent  es- 
timate of  Meyerbeer's  genius  I  have  already  quoted, 


152  GIACOMO   MEYERBEER 

felt  himself  impelled  to  write  of  this  admirable 
scene : 

"  We  observe  .  .  .  that,  despite  the  composer's  dis- 
tinct incapacity  to  give  us  from  his  own  musical  faculty  the 
slightest  evidence  of  musical  vitality,  he  nevertheless  raises 
himself  to  the  highest  and  most  incontestible  artistic  power 
in  certain  passages  of  his  opera  music.  These  passages  are  the 
offspring  of  a  genuine  inspiration,  and,  if  we  examine  more 
closely,  we  shall  perceive  whence  this  inspiration  has  come — 
clearly  from  the  poetic  nature  of  the  situation  itself.  Wher- 
ever the  poet  has  forgotten  his  trammelling  consideration  for 
the  musician,1  wherever  he  has  involuntarily  stumbled  upon 
a  situation  in  which  he  could  inhale  and  exhale  a  free,  ex- 
hilarating breath  of  actual  human  life,  he  directly  imparts  it 
to  the  musician  as  an  inspiring  afflatus ;  and  the  composer 
who,  even  by  exhausting  all  the  wealth  of  his  musical  pre- 
decessors, could  not  give  us  a  single  proof  of  real  creative 
power,  is  all  at  once  capable  of  the  richest,  noblest,  and  most 
soul-stirring  musical  expression.  I  refer  especially  to  sep- 
arate passages  in  the  well-known  heart-breaking  love  scene 
in  the  fourth  act  of  the  Huguenots,  and  emphatically  to 
the  invention  of  the  wondrously  affecting  melody  in  G-flat 
major — a  melody  which,  springing  as  it  does,  like  a  fragrant 
blossom,  from  a  situation  that  seizes  upon  all  the  fibres  of 
the  human  heart  with  rapturous  pain,  leaves  only  very  lit- 
tle, and  surely  only  that  which  is  most  perfect,  in  musical 
composition  to  be  brought  into  comparison  with  it." 

Of  hardly  less  emotional  power,  if  of  another 
sort,  is  the  slow  movement  of  the  dnet  between 

»  Meyerbeer  was  noted  for  forcing  his  librettist,  Scribe,  to  conform  en- 
tirely to  his  requirements  for  stage  effect  in  all  bis  operas.  See  farther  on. 


GIACOMO  MEYERBEER  153 

Valentine  and  Marcel  in  the  third  act  of  the  same 
opera.  Bertram's  phrase,  "  Be  ma  gloire  eclipsee, 
de  ma  splendeur  passee,"  in  the  third  act  of  Robert, 
brims  over  with  tragic  pathos. 

What  Meyerbeer  did  lack  was  the  sense  for  true 
grandeur ;  we  may  look  almost  in  vain  for  a  pas- 
sage of  really  impressive  solemnity  in  his  works. 
The  invocation  "Brahma,  Visnou,  Siva!"  in 
VAfricaine,  the  betrothal  scene  in  the  fifth  act  of 
les  Huguenots,  the  consecration  music  in  le  Pro- 
phet e,  all  lack  the  true  ring,  in  spite  of  their  often 
striking  effectiveness.  The  passage  which,  to  my 
mind,  savours  most  of  really  beautiful  solemnity  is 
a  phrase  for  brass  instruments  (at  first  in  D  major, 
later  in  B-flat  major)  in  the  priests'  march  in  the 
fourth  act  of  VAfricaine  —  a  phrase  only  eight 
measures  long,  which  is  of  singularly  impressive 
beauty ;  it  almost  sounds,  barring  the  instrumen- 
tation, like  Beethoven. 

When  he  entered  upon  the  domain  of  the  terri- 
ble, Meyerbeer  was  more  easily  at  home.  A  more 
trenchant  expression  of  savage  cruelty  than  the 
phrase  "  Tuez  les  Huguenots  !  "  in  the  fifth  act  of 
that  opera,  can  hardly  be  found  in  music.  The 
terrific  effect  of  the  Benediction  of  Poniards,  with 
its  surging  ' '  A  cette  cause  sainte,"  is  not  of  quite 
so  genuine  quality :  the  thing  is  what  the  French 
call  savamment  'ecrite, — which  is  not  quite  what 


154  GIACOMO  MEYERBEER 

we  mean  by  "learnedly  written," — rather  than 
freely  and  spontaneously  inspired  ;  it  smells  some- 
what of  the  lamp.  With  all  its  piling  the  Pelion 
of  physical  effectiveness  upon  the  Ossa  of  noise, 
it  has  not  the  frank,  irresistible  maelstrom-rnsh 
of  Verdi's  "  0  sommo  Carlo"  in  the  fourth  act  of 
Ernani.  Moreover,  it  utterly  lacks  nobility  of 
expression  ;  a  want  that  is  not  felt  in  the  "  Tuez 
les  Huguenots !  "  as  there  all  elevation  of  style  is 
out  of  the  question.  Most  of  the  infernal  music 
in  Rooert  is  conventionally  diabolic,  rather  than 
really  terrible.  Even  the  highly  beautiful  proces- 
sion of  nuns,  in  the  fourth  act,  owes  its  unearthly 
character  more  to  the  tam-tam  than  to  its  inherent 
musical  quality ;  and  its  low  3ds  and  6ths  on  two 
bassoons  soli  better  deserve  Liszt's  joke  (which 
need  not  be  repeated  here)  than  the  admiration 
their  would-be  ghastliness  has  often  called  forth. 
Still,  there  is  no  denying  that  Meyerbeer  has  done 
brilliant  things  in  this  field,  although  he  never 
rose  to  that  truly  poetic  pitch  of  diabolic  imagina- 
tiveness that  Weber  reached  in  his  Freischutz. 
When  he  supped  with  the  devil,  it  was  with  a 
tolerably  long  spoon. 

When  he  attempted  the  graceful  and  fascina- 
ting, his  habitual  want  of  spontaneity  handicapped 
him  not  a  little ;  he  also  had  a  tendency  to  fall 
into  the  trivial — a  besetting  sin  of  his.     Yet  he 


GIACOMO   MEYERBEER  155 

has  written  many  things  that  have  all  the  airy 
charm  of  native  grace.  Much  of  the  ballet  music 
in  Robert,  the  familiar  "Ombre  Ugere"  in  le 
Pardon  de  Ploermel,  Selika's  swan -song,  "  Un 
cygne  au  doux  ramage"  in  V Africaine,  are  good 
examples  of  what  Meyerbeer  could  do  in  the  siren 
vein. 

But,  upon  the  whole,  it  was  neither  in  the  terri- 
ble, the  passionate,  nor  the  graceful  and  charm- 
ing, that  Meyerbeer's  genius  displayed  itself  in  its 
fullest  glory.  It  was  in  the  realm  of  the  heroic, 
the  chivalric,  and  knightly,  that  he  was  most  con- 
spicuously at  home  and  worked  with  the  most  un- 
erring touch.  There  is  a  flavour  of  high-bred 
courtliness  and  mediaeval  gallantry  to  much  of 
Meyerbeer's  music,  for  which  we  look  in  vain  in 
the  works  of  his  contemporaries.  Wagner  never 
got  that  touch,  not  even  in  Tannhauser  nor  Zo- 
hengrin ;  he  could  be  heroic  enough,  and  in  the 
most  highly  poetic  way,  too ;  but  the  heroic  ele- 
ment in  his  music  was  more  akin  to  the  superhu- 
man or  godlike,  it  had  nothing  of  that  specific 
mondain  flavour  we  find  in  Meyerbeer's.  Where 
Wagner  painted  heroes  and  demi-gods,  Meyerbeer 
drew  gallant  knights  and  gentlemen.  It  is  this 
quality  that  shines  pre-eminent  in  such  masterly 
pages  as  the  duel  septet  for  male  voices  in  the  third 
act  of  the  Huguenots.     I  think  that,  in  this  in 


156  GIACOMO  MEYERBEER 

every  respect  wonderful  number,  and  notably  in 
the  overwhelming  phrase,  "  Et  bonne  'ep'ee  et  bon 
courage,  chacun  pour  soi  et  Dieu  pour  tous !  " 
Meyerbeer's  power  reaches  its  apogee  ;  I  know  of 
no  other  such  perfect  expression  of  the  devil-may- 
care  recklessness  and  knightly  gallantry  of  the 
medieval  cavalier  in  all  music.  Scarcely  less  fine 
in  this  respect  is  the  first  finale  of  VAfricaine 
(also  for  male  voices,  by  the  way),  from  Vasco 
de  Gama's  phrase,  "  D'impie  et  de  rebelle,"  to  the 
end,  albeit  here  the  somewhat  over-finical  har- 
mony detracts  a  little  from  the  native  fire  and 
vigour  of  the  melody.  The  bacchanalian  chorus, 
a  Aux  seuls  plaisirs  fideles"  the  Sicilienne,  "  0 
Fortune,  a  ton  caprice"  and  Isabelle's  air  with 
chorus,  "La  trompette  guerriere"  in  Robert  le 
Diable,  are  all  fine  examples  of  this  chivalric  qua- 
lity in  Meyerbeer ;  even  the  male  quartet  which 
closes  the  second  act  of  the  Prophete  has  some- 
thing of  it,  notably  in  the  phrase,  "  Et  la  cou- 
ronne  que  le  del  donne"  although  the  musical 
value  of  the  piece  is  not  great. 

Meyerbeer  was  not  a  great  contrapuntist.  He 
was  sufficiently  skilled  in  the  craft  not  to  let  his 
running,  or  imitative,  counterpoint  interfere  with 
the  dramatic  character  of  his  music ;  but  his 
counterpoint,  per  se  and  judged  on  its  own  merits, 
often  makes  one  smile.     Such  writing  as  is  to  be 


GIACOMO   MEYERBEER  157 

found  in  the  prelude  to  les  Huguenots,  or  the  one 
to  Robert  le  Diable,  is  too  flimsy  and  puerile, 
from  a  contrapuntal  point  of  view,  to  be  called 
even  respectable.  Places  where  he  has  preten- 
tiously worked  up  several  themes  together  —  as 
in  the  Pre-aux-Clercs  scene  in  the  Huguenots,  or 
the  scene  between  Valentine,  Raoul,  and  Marcel 
in  the  church,  in  the  fifth  act  of  the  same  opera — 
may  impress  the  unwary  as  fine  feats  of  polyphonic 
writing ;  but  the  technical  difficulties  conquered  in 
these  cases  were  not  really  serious,  neither  is  the 
skill  shown  in  conquering  them  such  as  to  call 
for  admiring  comment.  The  expert  sees  clearly 
enough  that  the  contrasted  themes  in  the  Pre-aux- 
Clercs  scene  were  first  written  together  in  score, 
before  being  given  out  separately ;  so  that  bring- 
ing them  into  conjunction  was  really  no  feat  at 
all.  On  the  other  hand,  the  famous  combination 
of  three  motives  (against  running  counterpoint,  to 
boot)  in  Wagner's  Meistersinger  prelude  does  not 
impress  one  as  being  the  result  of  any  such  sub- 
terfuge. 

Meyerbeer's  power  of  developing  one  or  more 
themes  into  an  extended  movement  of  sustained 
musical  interest  was,  in  general,  not  remarkable. 
The  purely  musical  aspect  of  his  elaborate  finales 
and  ensemble  pieces  is  not  precisely  what  is  most 
striking  about  them.     His  finest  effort  in  this 


158  GIACOMO  MEYERBEER 

direction  is  unquestionably  the  last  terzet,  "  Que 
faut-il  faire?"  in  Robert ;  and  this  is  closely 
grazed  by  the  stretto  of  the  first  finale  of  the  A- 
fricaine.  Yet  even  these  would  have  to  struggle 
hard  to  win  the  name  of  masterpieces  of  musical 
form.  But  he  knew  well  how  to  sustain  and  gra- 
dually intensify  the  dramatic  interest,  and  work  up 
to  an  effective  climax  in  his  grand  concerted  num- 
bers. Thus  the  finale  to  the  fourth  act  of  the 
Prophete  is  one  immense  crescendo  of  dramatic 
effectiveness,  albeit  that,  as  pure  music,  it  is  rather 
poor  and  commonplace.  The  one  great  stroke  in 
it,  Fides's  frantic  outburst,  "  L'ingrat !  Vingrat ! 
il  ne  me  reconnait  plus  !  "  deserved  stronger  and 
more  coherent  musical  treatment ;  the  phrase  itself 
was  a  really  powerful  inspiration,  and  the  musical 
weakness  of  its  working-out  is  all  the  more  ap- 
parent and  disheartening  that  the  phrase  contains 
figures  eminently  adapted  to  extended  develop- 
ment. 

The  strongly  dramatic  character  of  Meyerbeer's 
music  does  not  always  lie  in  itself  alone,  but  often 
in  the  opportunity  it  affords  the  singer  for  an  im- 
passioned or  imposingly  declamatory  style  of  deli- 
very. No  amount  of  vocal  ranting  can  seem  out  of 
place  in  some  of  Meyerbeer's  more  violent  pas- 
sages ;  they  seem  made  on  purpose  for  it.  Such 
things  as  "  A  cette  cause  sainte"  in  the  Benedic- 


GIACOMO  MEYERBEER  159 

tion  of  Poniards,  and  the  stretto  of  the  second 
finale  of  the  Huguenots  (perhaps  as  vile  a  bit 
of  musical  vulgarity  as  even  Meyerbeer  ever  was 
guilty  of,  fit,  as  has  been  said,  for  a  "revolution 
of  poissardes ")  can  not  be  overdone  in  perfor- 
mance. 

And  here  at  last  we  stumble  upon  the  word 
"  vulgarity."  It  must  be  admitted  that  it  is  im- 
possible to  speak  at  any  length  about  Meyerbeer 
without  using  it.  Of  all  his  faults,  his  innate 
tendency  toward  that  which  is  artistically  trivial 
and  vulgar  is  the  most  serious.  His  very  effec- 
tiveness is  often  vulgar  and  meretricious  in  itself. 
He  must  have  been  a  man  of  the  most  elastic  ar- 
tistic conscience ;  at  least,  it  is  inconceivable  how 
a  composer  who  could  write  one  quarter  of  what 
Meyerbeer  did  could  have  any  real  respect  for  the 
other  three  quarters.  He  so  often  makes  the  im- 
pression of  being  a  mere  musico-dramatic  pot- 
hunter ;  with  all  his  genius,  all  his  sense  for  what 
was  fine  and  noble,  his  appetite  for  praise  and 
pudding  was  so  enormous.  He  himself  once  ad- 
mitted that  he  never  could  forego  the  pleasure  of 
"  bringing  down  the  house,"  whenever  the  oppor- 
tunity presented  itself.  The  ostentation  of  his 
style  is  at  times  astounding.  In  spite  of  the  ge- 
nerally dramatic  atmosphere  of  his  music,  Rossini 
himself  could  not  have  exceeded  the  coolness  with 


160  GIACOMO   MEYERBEER 

which  he  would  sometimes  stop  the  impassioned 
flow  of  a  composition,  that  the  singer  might  have 
a  chance  of  displaying  her  vocal  flexibility  and 
agility  in  an  elaborate  cadenza.  He  knew  well 
enough  that  singers  are  fond  of  brilliant  bravura 
passages,  as  one  of  the  surest  means  of  reaping 
applause,  and  also  that  applause  bestowed  upon  a 
singer  is  pretty  sure  to  add  its  imputed  lustre  to 
the  music  sung;  so  he  loaded  his  scores  with 
brilliant  cadenzas.  These  vocal  cadenzas  of  Mey- 
erbeer's show  great  knowledge  of  the  voice  on  his 
part,  and  are  often  singularly  effective ;  yet  they 
also  are  apt  to  contrast  too  sharply  with  the  ge- 
neral character  of  the  pieces  in  which  they  occur, 
and  often  seem  actually  lugged  in  by  the  hair. 
They  are  not,  as  a  rule,  amalgamated  with  the  rest 
of  the  music,  like  the  florid  passages  in  Bellini  or 
Rossini.  Bellini's  and  Rossini's  vocal  coloratura — 
like  Chopin's  on  the  pianoforte — seems  often  but 
the  natural  efflorescence  of  the  melody  itself  ;  their 
melodies  now  and  then  blossom  out  into  florid  be- 
dizenment  as  naturally  and  beautifully  as  the  apple- 
branches  in  spring.  Meyerbeer's  coloratura,  on  the 
contrary,  too  often  seems  artificial,  sought  after 
with  malice  prepense,  and  intended  merely  for  dis- 
play. His  florid  cadenzas  for  several  voices,  of 
which  the  one  at  the  close  of  the  unaccompanied 
terzet,  "  Cruel  moment,  fatal  mystere,"  in   Ro- 


GIACOMO   MEYERBEER  161 

bert  le  Bidble  is  a  good  example,  have  long  been 
famous,  and  the  invention  of  this  sort  of  thing  has 
more  than  once  been  claimed  for  him.  But  these 
polyphonic  cadenzas  of  Meyerbeer's  are  really  a 
clean  steal  from — or,  to  put  it  more  politely,  a 
brilliant  and  effective  imitation  of — the  famous 
passage  in  B  major,  "  Wo  dein  sanfter  Fliigel 
weilt,"  in  Beethoven's  ninth  symphony.  I  well 
remember  being  present  at  a  rehearsal  of  the 
ninth  symphony  one  afternoon,  when,  after  the  solo 
quartet  had  sung  this  wonderful  passage,  and  the 
soprano  had  safely  alighted  from  her  dangerous 
high  B-natural,  a  musician  by  my  side  muttered : 
"  There  goes  one  of  Meyerbeer's  principal  claims 
to  originality  !  " 

Still,  the  charge  of  being  lugged  in  by  the  hair 
can  not  justly  be  brought  against  all  Meyerbeer's 
florid  vocal  writing;  in  some  cases  the  brilliant 
coloratura  is  quite  as  natural  an  outgrowth  and 
efflorescence  of  the  melody  itself  as  it  is  in  similar 
things  by  Rossini,  Bellini,  or  Donizetti.  In  his 
French  grand  operas,  Meyerbeer  was  fond  of  wri- 
ting essentially  coloratura  parts  for  light  soprano 
voices,  and  treated  them  quite  differently  from  his 
heavier  "  dramatic "  parts.  Such  parts  are  Isa- 
belle,  in  Robert  le  Diable ;  the  Queen,  in  les 
Huguenots ;  Berthe,  in  le  Prophete  The  music 
of  these  parts  is  essentially  florid  in  its  whole 
11 


162  GIACOMO  MEYERBEER 

plan,  the  ornamental  coloratura  blossoms  ont  from 
the  melody  itself,  instead  of  being  confined,  for  the 
most  part,  to  a  long  closing  cadenza.  Undoubt- 
edly these  florid,  light  soprano  roles  introduce  into 
his  scores  an  element  which  Meyerbeer  always  knew 
how  to  value — the  element  of  variety.  The  worst 
that  can  be  urged  against  them  is  that  all  this  dis- 
play of  vocal  agilita  gives  the  characters — who 
generally  happen  to  be  queens  or  princesses — some- 
what too  much  of  the  air  of  grisettes. 

There  is  one  characteristic  rhythmic  effect  which 
Meyerbeer  uses  ad  nauseam,  so  that  it  becomes  a 
serious  blemish  in  his  style  ;  his  fondness  for  this 
particular  rhythmic  device — which  may  be  de- 
scribed as  an  anapest,  with  the  ictus  on  the  first 
syllable — gave  rise  in  Germany  to  the  only  nick- 
name ever  bestowed  upon  him — the  "Cuckoo  of 
composers. "  As  the  cuckoo's  only  song  is  the 
repetition  of  its  own  name,  "Cuckoo!  cuckoo  I" 
so  does  Meyerbeer's  music  seem  to  keep  repeating 


Mey  -  er-beer !  Mey  -  er-beer! 

Most  of  Meyerbeer's  habitual  devices  are  ex- 
tremely simple.  Quite  a  number  of  his  melodies 
are  little  else  than  variations  of  familiar  bugle- 
calls,  written  for  the  open  notes  of  the  plain  bugle ; 
and  he  was  fond  of  harmonizing  them  in  two  parts, 


GIACOMO   MEYERBEER  163 

as  if  they  were  played  on  a  pair  of  bugles.  Such 
phrases  as  Bertrand's  "  Roi  des  enfers,  c'est  moi 
qui  vous  appellef"  in  Robert,  "  Et  la  couronne 
que  le  del  donne"  in  le  ProphUe,  and  many 
others,  come  under  this  head.  Even  the  great 
hymn,  "Roi  du  Ciel"  in  the  third  act  of  le 
Prophete,  might  be  ranked  with  these,  were  it  not 
for  its  full  harmony,  which  suggests  a  comparison 
with  a  certain  passage  in  B-flat  major  in  the  first 
movement  of  Beethoven's  fifth  pianoforte  concerto. 
Meyerbeer's  use  of  long  organ-points,  either  simple 
or  else  varied  by  accessory  notes  above  or  below,  is 
conspicuous  and  often  very  happy ;  his  rhythms 
are  usually  perspicuous,  well  marked,  and  full  of 
verve.  He  was  fond  of  sudden  surprises,  and 
sounded  all  the  depths  and  shoals  of  enharmonic 
modulation  ;  his  harmony  abounds  in  striking  sub- 
tleties and  unexpected  changes.  Of  instrumenta- 
tion, the  effective  grouping  of  voices,  and  all  the 
various  devices  of  musical  stage  effect,  he  was 
a  consummate  master ;  his  Etoile  du  Nord  was 
long  held  up  in  France  as  an  unsurpassed  model 
of  skill  in  the  treatment  of  wind  instruments. 
His  patience  was  indomitable  ;  he  would  write  and 
rewrite  certain  passages  over  and  over  again,  and 
have  them  sung  or  played  to  him  by  different  ar- 
tists time  after  time,  until  he  was  completely  satis- 
fied that  he  could  not  further  improve  them.     He 


164  GIACOMO   MEYERBEER 

had  the  true  Semitic  respect  for  small  details  ;  the 
story  has  often  been  told  of  his  paying  a  flute- 
player  (unattached  to  the  Academie  de  Musique) 
out  of  his  own  pocket,  because  he  was  the  only 
man  in  Paris  who  could  play  a  certain  cadenza  to 
his  liking. 

Upon  the  whole,  he  was  a  man  very  hard  to  imi- 
tate, but  exceedingly  easy  to  parody.  A  good  half 
of  Offenbach  may  be  called  a  laughable  parody  on 
Meyerbeer ;  many  of  the  ludicrous  effects  of  the 
buffoon  of  the  Varices  and  the  Bouffes-Parisiens 
can  claim  a  sort  of  left-handed  relationship  with 
the  music  of  the  king  of  the  Opera.  The  boule- 
vard resounds  with  a  burlesque  echo  of  the  rue 
Lepelletier.  In  some  cases,  indeed,  the  original 
outbids  the  parody  in  ridiculousness ;  such  fus- 
tian as  the  unison  phrase,  "  Fais  que  ta  grdce  in- 
fini-i-i-i-i-i-i-e"  in  the  first  act  of  the  Africaine, 
where  a  cyclopean  accent  falls  on  each  separate  i, 
goes  beyond  Offenbach. 

Meyerbeer  was  exceedingly  particular  about  his 
libretti ;  and  in  a  curious  way,  too,  for  hardly  a 
famous  composer  in  the  whole  list  has  set  worse 
ones  to  music.  What  he  cared  for  most  was  a 
series  of  chances  for  dramatic  effect,  for  effec- 
tive musical  treatment.  For  coherent  dramatic 
development  of  the  plot  he  cared  little ;  for 
historical,  geographical,  or  ethnological  accuracy, 


GIACOMO   MEYERBEER  165 

nothing  at  all.  Few  opera  texts  are  more  dis- 
jointed, confused,  and  hard  to  follow  than  that  of 
Robert  le  Diable,  although  most  of  the  scenes  in 
it,  taken  by  themselves,  are  admirably  dramatic. 
He  made  no  bones  of  having  his  Marcel,  the  old 
Huguenot  soldier,  sing  Luther's  "  Bin'  feste 
Burg,"  although  he  knew  well  enough  that  the 
Huguenots  were  Calvinists,  and  not  Lutherans ; 
but  he  also  knew  that  "  Ein'  feste  Burg"  was 
generally  familiar  in  France  as  the  war-cry  of 
Protestantism,  and  that  it  would  be  recognized  as 
such  by  his  audiences.  Its  dramatic  effect,  not  its 
sectarian  accuracy,  was  what  he  cared  for.  In 
like  manner,  it  did  not  trouble  him  a  whit  that 
Vasco  de  Gama  (in  VAfricaine)  should  find  Brah- 
manical  religious  rites  flourishing  on  the  island  of 
Madagascar  ;  Brahma,  Vishnu,  and  Siva  gave  him 
a  chance  to  write  some  gorgeous  ceremonial  music, 
and  that  was  enough.  This  passion  of  Meyerbeer's 
for  effect  pure  and  simple,  effect  quand  mime  and 
at  all  hazards,  led  Wagner  to  say  of  him — with 
something  of  over-subtlety,  perhaps  : 

11  The  secret  of  Meyerbeer's  opera  music  is — effect.  .  .  . 
Would  we  express  more  exactly  what  we  understand  by  this 
word,  we  might  translate  '  effect '  by  result  without  a  cause 
(Wirkung  ohne   Ursache).*    Indeed  the  effect  Meyerbeer's 

1  Here  Wagner  makes  a  subtle  distinction  between  the  two  German 
words  for  "  effect,"  using  Effekt  (of  Latin  derivation)  either  half-ironi- 


166  GIACOMO  MEYERBEER 

music  produces  upon  those  who  are  able  to  find  edification 
therein  is  wanting  in  an  efficient  cause.  This  miracle  is 
possible  only  to  the  most  superficial  music  ;  i.e..  to  a  power 
of  expression  that  has  striven  (in  the  opera)  to  become  more 
and  more  independent  of  all  that  was  worthy  to  be  ex- 
pressed, and  proclaims  its  independence  by  degrading  the 
subject  matter,  through  which  alone  it  could  rationally 
exist  and  be  justified,  to  such  a  level  of  moral  and  artistic 
nothingness,  that  it  in  turn  can  find  its  existence,  proper 
proportions,  and  justification  only  in  an  act  of  abstract 
musical  volition,  which,  as  such,  is  wanting  in  all  true  ex- 
pression. 

This  is  tantamount  to  saying  that  Meyerbeer's 
tremendous  effects  are  too  often  to  be  recognized 
as  merely  superficial  and  artificial,  not  resting  on 
any  profound  psychological  basis.  The  criticism 
is  just  enough  in  the  main,  although  it  makes  one 
smile  a  little ;  for  the  bare  idea  of  Meyerbeer's 
taking  either  himself  or  his  art  as  seriously  as  all 
that,  could  surely  have  occurred  only  to  a  man  as 
desperately  in  earnest  as  Wagner. 

Meyerbeer  led  Scribe,  his  librettist  en  titre,  a 
dog's  life  with  his  perpetual  demands  for  altera- 
tions ;  indeed  Wagner  may  have  been  quite  right — 
and  far  more  to  the  point  than  in  his  hair-splitting 
about  "  EffeM  "  and  ' '  WirTcung  " — in  suspecting 

cally,  or  else  in  a  bad  sense,  and  Wirkung  (of  Teutonic  origin)  in  a  good 
sense.  The  whole  passage  reflects  Wagner's  pet  idea  of  the  intimate 
union  of  Poetry  and  Music,  and  of  the  impossibility  of  a  noble  musical 
conception  coming  from  anything  but  a  lofty  poetic  inspiration. 


GIACOMO   MEYERBEER  167 

that  it  was  mainly  owing  to  Meyerbeer's  obstinate 
interference  that  the  usually  bright,  clever,  and 
spirituel  Scribe,  the  crowned  master  of  dramatic 
construction,  turned  out  such  ridiculous  libretti 
for  him.  But  Meyerbeer  knew  well  what  he 
wanted,  and  would  not  rest  till  he  got  it ;  Heine's 
saying  of  Robert : 

Von  Meyerbeer  ist  die  Musik, 
Der  schlechte  Text  von  Scribe, 

probably  did  not  trouble  him  in  the  least,  no  mat- 
ter how  Scribe  might  feel  about  it.  One  may  even 
suspect  that  Meyerbeer's  finicking  interference 
with  his  librettist  may  at  times  have  been  fruitful 
in  good  results.  Of  course,  it  is  impossible,  at 
this  distance,  to  tell  with  any  degree  of  certainty 
what  things  in  the  texts  of  Meyerbeer's  operas 
were  due  to  his  suggestion  ;  but  one  now  and  then 
hits  upon  a  passage  which  seems  as  if  it  must  have 
been  imagined  by  him.  Take,  for  instance,  the 
whole  planning-out  of  the  scene  between  Alice 
and  Bertrand  in  the  forest,  in  the  third  act  of 
Robert  le  Diable  ;  one  can  not  escape  the  suspicion 
that  Meyerbeer  must  have  had  a  hand  in  it.  You 
may  look  through  the  whole  field  of  lyric  drama 
without  finding  a  scene  more  admirably  adapted — 
and  apparently  with  direct  intent — to  musical 
treatment.     The  text  of  this  duet  doubles  upon 


168  GIACOMO  MEYERBEER 

itself  like  a  hare,  just  as  the  musical  form  does 
that  was  almost  invariable  in  Meyerbeer's  day. 
When  the  opening  phrase,  to  which  Bertrand  sings 
his  "Mais  Alice,  qu'as-tu  done?"  returns  near 
the  end  at  Bertrand's  words,  "  Ainsi,  tu  n'as  rien 
vu  f "  as  it  should  to  complete  the  circle  of  the 
musical  form,  we  find  that  it  is  quite  as  exactly 
expressive  of  the  sense  of  the  words  as  it  was  in 
the  beginning  ;  and  yet  the  dramatic  development 
of  the  scene  has  gone  on  as  uninterruptedly  as 
possible.  This  result  could  hardly  have  been  ob- 
tained with  a  less  ingenious  planning-out  of  the 
scene.  Bertrand,  fresh  from  his  diabolic  incanta- 
tions, finds  Alice  alone  in  the  forest,  and  fears  she 
may  have  been  a  witness  of  what  he  has  been  do- 
ing ;  he  accordingly  plies  her  with  a  series  of  ques- 
tions, to  discover  how  much  she  has  seen  or  heard, 
to  each  of  which  questions  the  terrified  girl  an- 
swers "Rien!"  ("Nothing!")  But  Bertrand 
sees  plainly  enough  from  her  manner  that  she 
really  has  seen  something,  and  threatens  her 
with  the  most  terrible  mishaps  to  her  and 
hers,  if  she  should  dare  to  reveal  a  jot  of  it. 
Having  thus  got  her  completely  in  his  power,  he 
then  proceeds  to  put  a  second  series  of  questions 
to  her  —  only  ironically,  this  time  —  again  asking 
her  what  she  has  seen  or  heard ;  to  all  of  which 
the  poor  girl  can  only  answer  "Rien!  "  precisely 


GIACOMO   MEYERBEER  169 

as  she  did  at  first.  It  is  jnst  this  second,  ironical 
series  of  questions  that  I  strongly  suspect  of  ha- 
ving been  suggested  to  Scribe  by  Meyerbeer;  it 
shows  the  musician's  keen  eye  for  a  chance  to 
bring  back  his  theme  according  to  a  regular  musi- 
cal plan,  and  at  the  same  time,  the  essentially 
dramatic  composer's  solicitude  for  having  this  re- 
turn of  his  theme  dramatically  justified.  In  this 
respect  the  scene  is,  as  far  as  I  know,  unique  in  the 
annals  of  opera ;  one  may  say  that  its  dramatic 
working-out  follows  an  essentially  musical  scheme. 
In  the  course  of  this  essay  I  have  more  than 
once  taken  occasion  to  refer  to  Meyerbeer's  dra- 
matic power.  This  was  really  the  ground-tone  of 
the  man's  genius.  If  his  conscious  striving  was 
ever  toward  effectiveness,  effectiveness  in  any  and 
every  imaginable  way,  the  true  bent  of  his  better 
genius  was  essentially  dramatic.  This  is  one  rea- 
son why  he  found  so  congenial  a  field  in  France  ; 
for  French  opera  had,  from  the  beginning,  always 
been  intrinsically  dramatic  in  character.  And 
perhaps  the  chief  secret  of  his  immediate  and 
overwhelming  success  in  Paris  was  that,  besides 
being  dramatic  by  instinct,  he,  either  by  instinct 
or  by  calculation,  gave  expression  to  his  dramatic 
conceptions  in  an  essentially  theatrical  and  scenic 
way.  No  Frenchman  ever  had  a  finer  entente  de 
la  seine,  a  keener  sense  for  the  stage,  than  Meyer- 


170  GIACOMO   MEYERBEER 

beer.  And,  new  as  his  music  was  in  many  re- 
spects, great  as  were  the  changes  he  introduced 
into  the  art  of  opera  writing,  he  fell  in  with  the 
prevailing  French  views  on  theatrical  art  in  a  way, 
and  to  an  extent,  exceedingly  few  foreigners  had 
done  before  him.  His  changes,  reforms  —  call 
them  what  you  will — were  not  like  Wagner's, 
attempts  fundamentally  to  remodel  the  very  idea 
of  the  lyric  drama  itself ;  what  he  did  was  far 
more  in  the  way  of  showing  the  French,  with  the 
greatest  possible  distinctness,  exactly  what  the 
operatic  ideal  was  that  had  long  vaguely  hovered 
before  their  mental  vision,  and  bringing  the  form 
of  the  grand  opera  into  closer  sympathy  with  that 
ideal  than  it  had  been  before.  I  do  not  see  how 
his  immediate  success  with  the  French  can  be  ex- 
plained on  other  grounds. 

There  were  things  in  Robert  le  Didble,  his  first 
French  grand  opera,  which  both  frightened  and 
disheartened  all  who  took  part  in  the  rehearsals  ; 
some  of  the  music  was  so  utterly  unprecedented  in 
character,  if  not  in  form,  that  the  singers  had  no 
little  difficulty  in  understanding  it  and,  from  Dr. 
Paul  Veron,  then  director  of  the  Academie  de 
Musique,  down  to  the  scene-shifters,  every  one 
connected  with  the  undertaking  predicted  its  flat 
failure  with  the  public.  It  takes  a  certain  mental 
effort  for  us  now  to  appreciate  how  absolutely  and 


GIACOMO   MEYERBEER  171 

audaciously  new  the  whole  aspect  of  much  of  this 
music  was  in  1831 ;  how  strangely,  for  instance, 
the  duet  between  Alice  and  Bertrand,  referred  to 
above,  must  have  sounded  in  French  ears  then  ! 
It  took  no  mean  daring  to  present  such  a  thing  to 
the  public  in  those  days.  Yet  the  public  did  like 
it,  when  they  heard  it  ;  for,  as  I  have  surmised,  it 
was  really  in  harmony  with  their  half -formulated 
ideas  of  what  opera  should  be,  it  was  what  they 
had  long  unconsciously  wanted — only  more  so. 

Meyerbeer's  originality  was  perhaps  more  one  of 
manner  than  of  matter.  Yet  we  must  recognize 
that,  in  one  particular  at  least,  he  gave  the  world 
a  new  form  of  melodic  phraseology,  so  to  speak ; 
he  did  much  toward  the  development  and  estab- 
lishment of  a  new  form  of  melodic  phrase  of  the 
most  intensely  dramatic  character,  a  form  which, 
since  his  day,  has  become  peculiarly  associated 
with  French  opera.  He  would  bring  in  a  puissant 
phrase,  at  once  melodic  and  declamatory,  just  at 
the  crucial  point  of  a  song,  or  scene,  and  in  a  way 
that  made  its  effect  positively  overwhelming.  Isa- 
belle's  "  Grdce,  gr dee  pour  toi-meme!"  in  Robert, 
is  a  phrase  of  this  sort ;  cela  fait  explosion,  as  the 
French  say,  bursts  forth  unexpectedly  and  carries 
everything  before  it.  The  characteristic  "  Meyer- 
beer phrase"  was  not  very  long  in  crossing  the 
French  frontier;  hints  at  it  are  to  be  found  in 


172  GIACOMO   MEYERBEER 

Leonora's  "  Prima  che  d'altrui  vivere,  io  volli  tua 
morir"  in  the  fourth,  act  of  Verdi's  Trovatore, 
and  especially  in  Manrico's  agonized  response, 
"  Insano  !  ed  io  quest'  angelo  osava  maledir  !  "  al- 
though Verdi  has  here  expressed  a  warmth  of  pas- 
sion quite  his  own.  But,  if  here  in  the  Trovatore 
one  finds  hints  at  Meyerbeer's  example,  in  the 
other  Leonora's  "  Deh  I  non  m'abhandonar,  pieta  di 
me,  Signore"  in  la  Forza  del  Destino,  you  find  the 
whole  Meyerbeer  himself.  And,  if  this  sort  of  dra- 
matic phrase  made  its  way  into  Italy  through 
Verdi, — who  has  from  the  beginning  steadily  stood 
in  the  van  of  Italian  dramatic  composition, — it 
may  be  imagined  how  it  spread  and  grew  in  France. 
Perhaps  the  grandest  example  of  it  in  Meyerbeer 
is  Fides's  "  Que  vers  le  Ciel  s'eleve  ma  priere  (in 
"Ah!  monfils")  in  the  Prophele;  yet  even  this 
glorious  outburst  is  surpassed  in  breadth  of  me- 
lodic style,  if  not  in  brilliancy  and  'eclat,  by  Dalila's 
"Ah!  reponds  a  ma  tendresse"  in  Saint-Saens's 
Samson  et  Dalila,  written  a  quarter  of  a  century 
later. 

What  I  have  called  the  "  Meyerbeer  phrase  "  is 
not,  however,  the  only,  nor  perhaps  even  the  chief, 
exponent  of  his  dramatic  power  as  a  composer. 
Upon  the  whole,  it  may  be  said  that  the  true 
dramatic  force  of  Meyerbeer's  music  does  not  re- 
side in  intense  sporadic  outbursts  so  much  as  it 


GIACOMO   MEYERBEER  173 

does  in  the  great  total  impression  the  music  pro- 
duces ;  he  not  only  had  the  keenest  eye  for  effec- 
tive details,  but  had  also  a  rare  power  of  grasping 
the  general  drift  of  a  dramatic  plot  and  reflecting 
its  prime  characteristics  in  his  music.  To  cull  a 
simile  from  another  art,  Meyerbeer  was  especially 
remarkable  for  the  striking  impressiveness  and  dra- 
matic suggestiveness  of  his  musical  backgrounds. 
Take,  for  example,  les  Huguenots :  from  the  very 
first  there  is  an  undercurrent  of  unrest,  anxiety, 
potential  turbulence  in  the  music,  admirably  sug- 
gestive of  the  social  and  political  disquiet  of  the 
times  in  which  the  scene  is  laid ;  the  colouring  is 
for  the  most  part  sombre,  what  flashes  of  light 
come  now  and  then  shine  bright  against  a  dark 
background,  and  make  its  darkness  all  the  blacker- 
seeming  ;  nervous,  fitful  figures  keep  cropping  up 
in  the  medium  and  lower  registers  of  the  orches- 
tra ;  you  feel  that  you  have  fallen  upon  times  that 
are  out  of  joint,  that  all  the  dramatis  persona  are 
walking  on  volcanic  ground,  and  that  an  explosion 
may  come  at  any  moment.  A  similar  background 
of  characteristic  suggestiveness  is  to  be  found  in 
the  music  of  his  other  French  grand  operas,  of 
Robert  le  Diable,  le  Prophete,  and  VAfricaine. 

With  all  the  good  and  bad  sides  of  Meyerbeer's 
genius,  with  all  his  strength  and  weakness,  his 
genuine  power  and  studied  artificiality,  one  can 


174  GIACOMO   MEYERBEEB 

not  but  recognize  in  the  end  that  the  man,  taken 
as  a  whole,  was  one  of  the  greatest  figures  in  the 
history  of  the  opera.  He  was  not  only  great,  he 
was  distinctly  epoch-making ;  he  set  his  seal  upon 
a  whole  era  of  French  musico-dramatic  produc- 
tion. The  history  of  French  grand  opera  may  be 
divided  into  four  great  periods,  at  the  portal  of 
each  of  which  stands  the  figure  of  a  great  dramatic 
composer ;  the  names  of  these  four  men,  who 
successively  set  and  remodelled  the  form  of  grand 
opera  in  France,  and,  from  the  Academie  de 
Musique  in  Paris,  exerted  the  strongest  influence 
upon  dramatic  composition  all  over  the  musical 
world,  were  Jean  -  Baptiste  Lully  (1672-1687), 
Jean-Philippe  Rameau  (1733-1762),  Christoph 
Willibald,  Bitter  von  Gluck  (1774-1779),  and 
Giacomo  Meyerbeer  (1831-1864).1  No  doubt 
other  men  besides  these  have  shown  themselves 
great  and  original  on  that  famous  stage  of  the  Paris 
Academie  de  Musique ;  but  none  of  them  really 
succeeded  in  definitely  fixing,  if  only  for  a  period, 
the  general  formula  of  French  grand  opera  as  they 
did.  Spontini  but  carried  on  and  further  deve- 
loped the  Gluck  formula  ;  Auber  and  Rossini  (with 
la  Muette  de  Portici  and  Guillaume  Tell)  at  best 

1  These  dates  refer,  not  to  the  composers'  birth  and  death,  bnt  to  the 
first  performances  of  their  first  and  last  grand  operas  at  the  Academie 
de  Musique. 


GIACOMO   MEYERBEER  175 

only  lisped  and  stammered  out  the  formula  which 
Meyerbeer  was  soon  afterwards  distinctly  to  pro- 
nounce and  firmly  establish  ;  Berlioz,  albeit  by 
no  means  so  much  of  an  innovator  in  opera  as  has 
sometimes  been  imagined,  was  musically  too  far  in 
advance  of  his  day  to  hold  the  boards  at  the  Aca- 
demie  de  Musique  at  all,  so  that  his  influence  upon 
the  form  of  French  opera  was  virtually  null.  And 
since  Meyerbeer,  although  his  formula  has  been 
variously  modified  and  stretched  by  Gounod,  Am- 
broise  Thomas,  Massenet,  and  others,  no  one  has 
yet  appeared  who  could  really  establish  a  new  one  ; 
the  Meyerbeer  formula  still  survives  in  France.1 

1 1  may  now  (1894)  add  as  a  postscript  to  this  that  not  only  does  the 
Meyerbeer  formula  still  maintain  its  prestige  in  France,  but  that  the  ge- 
neral character  of  opera  writing  in  Italy  and  Germany  for  the  last  quarter 
of  a  century— as  illustrated  in  the  one  country  by  Karl  Goldmark,  and  in 
the  other  by  Verdi,  Ponchielli,  and  Bolto,  not  to  mention  the  two  newest 
"  one-act "  heroes,  Mascagni  and  Leoncavallo— seems  to  me,  after  ma- 
ture consideration,  to  have  been  far  more  distinctly  influenced  by  Meyer- 
beer than  by  either  Weber  or  Wagner.  The  direct  Weber  influence  evapo- 
rated inMarschner,  Lindpaintner,  and  the  younger  Wagner  (Der  fliegende 
Hollander  and  Tannhduser) ;  and,  in  so  far  as  regards  Wagner's  influ- 
ence, the  most  that  can  be  said  is  that  the  Meyerbeer  formula,  in  France, 
Italy,  and  Germany,  has  of  late  years  been  stretching  to  a  certain  extent 
in  a  Wagnerian  direction,  but  has  as  yet  exhibited  few  symptoms  of 
being  ready  really  to  snap. 


JACQUES  OFFENBACH 


JACQUES  OFFENBACH 

O  shrieking  beloved  brother-blockheads  of  Mankind  !  let 
us  close  those  wide  mouths  of  ours  ;  let  us  cease  shrieking, 
and  begin  considering  !— Thomas  Carlyle. 

How  far  human  generosity  should  he  allowed  to 
insist  on  Be  mortuis  nil,  nisi  honum,  to  the  pos- 
sible hurt  of  human  justice,  may  be  a  matter  of 
opinion.  Our  finer  feelings  may  at  times  almost 
respect  those  old  tombstones  which,  as  Dickens 
says,  "  droopingly  incline  from  the  perpendicular, 
as  if  they  were  ashamed  of  the  lies  they  tell."  It 
is,  upon  the  whole,  an  honest  love  of  fair  play  that 
leads  us  to  frown  upon  hitting  a  man  after  he  is 
once  hopelessly  down.  Yet  the  tardy  praise  grim 
Death  wrings  from  lips  long  used  to  scolding,  is  but  a 
transparent  make-believe,  which  cuts  a  poor  figure 
enough  in  the  presence  of  the  sternest  of  human 
realities.  Sleek  obituary  panegyrics  are  too  often 
the  depreciated  paper  currency  of  praise.  There 
are  times  when  the  truth  is  more  generous  than 
empty  eulogizing.     Notably,  when  a  man's  career 


180  JACQUES   OFFENBACH 

has  thrown  half  the  world  into  hysterics,  a  return 
to  sober  consideration  may  be  a  more  fitting  tribute 
to  his  memory  than  the  smooth  lying  of  a  hack- 
neyed funeral  sermon. 

Such  a  man  was  Jacques  Offenbach.1  His  for- 
tunes in  this  world  were,  in  one  particular,  unlike 
those  of  most  men  of  genius  :  he  was  famous  and 
acclaimed  by  the  masses  during  his  lifetime ;  but 
the  selecter  few  for  the  most  part  refused  his  talent 
that  recognition  which  is,  after  all,  the  sweetest 
praise  in  the  artist's  ear.  It  is  only  now  he  is  dead 
that  the  leaders  of  musical  thought  deem  him 
worthy  of  something  better  than  pooh-poohing, 
let  alone  the  shrieking  reprobation  the  less  stolid 
of  his  judges  once  thought  proper  to  hurl  at  him. 
But  his  death  seems  both  to  have  calmed  his  loud 
defamers  and  opened  the  eyes  of  those  who  persis- 
tently ignored  him  ;  the  more  intelligent  are  even 
beginning  to  ask  themselves :  Was  not  he,  after 
all,  a  man  of  real  genius  ?    Let  us  see. 

To  be  so  far  in  advance  of  one's  generation  as  to 
take  the  lead  in  transforming  and  reforming  popu- 
lar opinion,  by  setting  up  new  ideals,  has  been 
considered  the  most  authentic  charter  of  original 
genius.  Yet,  in  lack  of  this  high  faculty,  are 
there  no  other  attributes  by  which  genius  can  be 
recognized  ?    It  seems  to  me  that  he  who  can  se- 

1  Obiit,  October  5,  1880. 


JACQUES   OFFENBACH  181 

curely  present  himself  to  the  world  as  the  incarna- 
tion of  certain  already  existing  ideas,  who  can  so 
grasp  the  gist  of  this  or  that  popular  tendency  as 
to  carry  it  to  its  farthest  conclusion,  and  give  it 
unmistakably  distinct  utterance,  is  by  no  means  de- 
void of  one  phase  of  genius.  At  worst,  it  bespeaks 
a  certain  amount  of  genuine  power  in  a  man  to  be- 
come supremely  fashionable ;  the  ability  to  lead 
popular  taste  is  akin  to  that  of  leading  popular 
thought  and  opinion. 

Offenbach's  talent  was  of  this  sort.  If  any  one 
incline  to  think  the  word  genius  too  noble  a  title 
to  be  bestowed  upon  Offenbach's  peculiar  gift,  let 
him  consider  for  a  moment  how  widely  the  man 
has  been  imitated,  and  how  far  short  of  the  ori- 
ginal all  copies  have  fallen  ;  in  a  word,  how  unique 
he  was.  That  musicians  of  high  aim,  and  music- 
lovers  jealous  of  the  good  repute  of  the  art,  should 
have  either  decried  or  ignored  Offenbach,  was  per- 
haps natural.  He  knew  how  to  give  an  undeni- 
ably low  order  of  music  a  degree  of  prominence  in 
the  eyes  of  the  world  at  large,  which  might  easily 
divert  public  attention  unduly  from  more  serious 
and  worthy  phases  of  the  art.  Perhaps  musicians 
in  general  err  on  the  side  of  adhering  to  a  too  rigid 
standard  of  criticism.  As  the  State  does  not  levy 
an  income  tax  upon  citizens  whose  yearly  earnings 
do  not  reach  a  certain  figure,  so  are  musicians  too 


182  JACQUES  OFFENBACH 

prone  to  look  upon  all  music  which  does  not  aim 
at  certain  fixed  ideals  as  lying  outside  the  pale  of 
criticism ;  they  acknowledge  its  existence  only 
when  they  see  it  tending  to  encroach  upon  their 
own  cherished  ground  ;  then  they  cry  out  against 
it  as  a  nuisance,  much  as  the  dandy  ignores  the 
greasy  cad,  until  the  latter  happens  to  tread  upon 
his  delicate  toes. 

Thus  musicians  and  the  more  serious  critics  ig- 
nored Offenbach  until  the  time  when  the  ever- 
growing popularity  of  his  works  threatened  to  oust 
the  more  "legitimate"  lyric  drama  from  its  right- 
ful place  in  the  world's  attention.  Then  a  terrific 
outcry  was  raised,  and  Offenbach  was  so  thorough- 
ly ostracized  from  artistic  respectability  that  his 
name  became  a  byword  for  anything  you  please 
that  was  aesthetically  reprehensible.  It  must  be 
admitted  that  this  sort  of  outlawry  sat  easily 
enough  on  him.  It  is  also  true  that  the  general 
taboo  pronounced  against  him  had  its  excusable 
side.  Acknowledged  (or  unacknowledged)  guard- 
ians of  the  public  taste  did  not  have  to  consider 
very  nicely  the  justice  of  their  verdict  from  an  ar- 
tistic point  of  view ;  for  the  man's  work  was  un- 
fortunately so  open  to  attack  on  ethical  grounds, 
that  to  sneer  at  his  artistic  faculty  was  superfluous, 
except  in  so  far  as  it  might  add  spice  to  the  ge- 
neral censure  of  its  moral  tendencies.     In  even  the 


JACQUES   OFFENBACH  183 

most  unbiassed  consideration  of  Offenbach's  works, 
it  is  impossible  wholly  to  lose  sight  of  their  pe- 
culiar ethical  character.  In  his  earlier  operettas 
he  was  innocent  enough.     A.  W.  Ambros  says  : 

"  The  Manage  aux  Lanternes  showed  Offenbach  to  be  fol- 
lowing in  Auber's  footsteps.  But  he  was  to  leave  that  path 
soon  enough.  The  abysmal  corruption  of  the  Second  Empire 
was  not  to  be  served  with  wit  and  humour  alone ;  it  de- 
manded a  moral  game-flavour — the  stronger,  the  better ! 
Offenbach's  comic  muse  (or  whatever  the  capricious  being 
who  inspires  him  may  be  called)  began  to  show  a  more  and 
more  distinct  faun's  smile,  and  la  Belle  Helene  at  last  struck 
the  key-note  of  what  has  ever  since  been  the  prevailing  mode 
with  Offenbach,  and  the  servum  pecus  imitatorum  who  have 
founded  themselves  on  him." 

One  may  say  that  this  "  moral  game-flavour  *  was 
an  integral  factor  of  Offenbach's  talent.1  The 
man's  success  depended  on  it  to  a  notable  degree. 
He  was  a  caricaturist  rather  than  a  satirist ;  the 
true  gist  of  his  humour  lay  in  its  intrinsic  laugh- 
ableness, not  in  its  pointing  a  moral.  Offenbach 
was  anything  but  didactic.  In  his  humour  he 
knew  how  to  appeal  to  a  certain  side  of  our  human 

*  Of  course  it  may  be  claimed  that  this  "  game-flavour  "  is  mainly  to  be 
laid  to  the  charge  of  his  librettists,  Meilhac  and  Hal6vy ;  hut  apart  from 
the  patent  fact  that  it  bears  Offenbach's  endorsement,  we  must  remember 
that  no  composer  has  ever  shown  himself  in  closer  sympathy  with  his 
librettists  than  he.  In  his  operas  the  music  is  so  indissoluhly  wedded  to 
the  text  and  action,  that  we  can  not  justly  consider  either  apart  from 
the  other. 


184  JACQUES  OFFENBACH 

nature  which,  argue  as  we  may,  we  must  finally 
acknowledge  as  a  genuine  instinct.  He  took  hold 
of  his  public  by  what  the  French  call  their  inhe- 
rent cynisme — we  have  no  English  word  which 
exactly  expresses  it.  Upon  the  divine  head  of 
every  ideal,  which  by  its  loftiness  could  stand  as  a 
reproach  to  our  human  weakness,  his  cunning 
hand  set  the  jester's  cap  and  bells,  and  we  sud- 
denly saw  all  we  had  hitherto  been  wont  to  reve- 
rence decked  out  in  such  antic  fashion,  so  perverted 
from  its  native  dignity,  that  what  might  else  have 
been  a  burning  sense  of  our  own  shortcomings  was 
straightway  smothered  in  unrestrained  laughter. 

Offenbach's  power  was,  in  a  sense,  Satanic ;  he 
might  have  said,  with  Mephisto,  "  Ich  bin  der 
Geist,  der  stets  verneint  " — I  am  the  Spirit  that 
denies.  He  put  the  negative  sign  before  all  our 
ideals,  and  showed  us  their  pictures  as  reflected  in 
the  Devil's  mirror. 

Emile  Zola  has  given  an  admirable  description  of 
the  effect  upon  the  public  of  this  sort  of  carica- 
ture ;  he  does  not  mention  Offenbach  by  name,  but 
that  was  not  necessary  : — 

"...  From  this  moment  the  popularity  of  the  piece 
was  assured ;  a  grand  success  began  to  unfold  itself.  This 
carnival  of  the  gods — Olympus  dragged  through  the  mire,  a 
whole  religion,  a  whole  age  of  poetry  scoffed  at — seemed  an 
exquisite  treat.     The  literary  world  of  opening  nights  caught 


JACQUES   OFFENBACH  185 

the  fever  of  irreverence  ;  legend  was  trampled  under  foot, 
antique  images  broken.  Jupiter  had  the  cut  of  a  fool ;  Mars 
was  well  hit  off.  Royalty  became  a  farce,  and  the  army  a 
laughing-stock.  When  Jupiter,  suddenly  smitten  with  a 
little  washerwoman,  began  to  dance  a  furious  can-can,  Si- 
monne,  who  played  the  part  of  the  washerwoman,  kicked  up 
her  heels  into  the  very  face  of  the  father  of  the  gods,  calling 
him  '  Old  Boy '  so  drolly  that  mad  laughter  shook  the  house. 
While  they  were  dancing,  Phoebus  stood  treat  to  bowls  of 
negus  for  Minerva,  and  Neptune  was  installed  in  the  midst 
of  a  bevy  of  seven  or  eight  women  who  fed  him  on  cookies. 
Allusions  were  understood,  ribaldries  added,  inoffensive 
words  perverted  from  their  meaning  by  exclamations  from 
the  stalls.  For  a  long  while  the  public  had  not  wallowed  in 
more  disrespectful  folly  at  a  theatre.     It  rested  them." 

I  know  of  no  argument  against  the  immorality 
of  opera-bouffe  of  the  Offenbach  type  more  con- 
vincing than  this  simple  description,  the  truthful- 
ness of  which  is  too  evident  to  be  questioned. 

Yet  it  should  be  said,  in  justice,  that  the  ethical 
point  of  view  is  the  only  one  from  which  Offen- 
bach can  be  utterly  condemned.  Schopenhauer 
has  said : — 

"  The  origin  of  the  Laughable  is  always  the  paradoxical, 
and  hence  unexpected,  subsumption  of  an  object  (Gegen- 
stand)  under  a  conception  (Begrtff)  with  which  it  is  really 
irreconcilable  ;  and  the  phenomenon  of  laughter  always  in- 
dicates the  sudden  perception  of  an  incongruity  between 
such  a  conception  and  the  real  object  which  is  comprehended 


186  JACQUES   OFFENBACH 

under  it ;  that  is  to  say,  between  the  Abstract  and  the  Per- 
ceptible {dem  Anschaidichen)." 

By  the  light  of  this  definition  of  the  laughable, 
or  comic,  we  can  appreciate  the  profound  meaning 
of  another  saying  of  the  same  philosopher.  He 
says  (I  quote  from  memory)  that  the  well-known 
tendency  of  men  to  indulge  themselves  in  slippery 
joking  on  the  marriage  relation,  and  all  that  per- 
tains to  the  same,  springs  from  their  intuitive 
recognition  of  this  relation  as  the  most  entirely 
serious  business  of  life,  and  the  one  fraught  with 
the  most  momentous  consequences  to  human  so- 
ciety. To  treat  this  most  solemn  theme  lightly  is, 
therefore,  to  do  the  most  incongruous  thing  in  our 
power,  and  this  incongruity  is  really  the  acme  of 
the  comic  ;  to  be  laughed  at,  however,  only  by  him 
who  forgets  that  the  ghastly  joke  tells  most  against 
himself,  or,  as  Wagner  poetically  puts  it,  by  him 
who  "  hears  not  his  own  shrieks  of  pain,  the  while 
he  tears  his  own  flesh. " 

If  the  indecency — to  use  no  worse  word — of 
much  of  Offenbach's  humour  is  ethically  condem- 
nable,  it  yet  has  its  artistic  side.  If  the  word  deli- 
cacy  can  be  used  at  all  in  such  a  connection,  it  may 
be  said  that  this  peculiar  game-flavour  is  the  most 
delicate  part  of  Offenbach's  comic  faculty,  the  only 
part  that  is  not  of  the  nature  of  broad  caricature 
and  farce.     Here  he  shows  genuine  subtlety  and 


JACQUES   OFFENBACH  187 

pithiness  of  innuendo.  We  in  America  have  seldom 
had  an  opportunity  to  judge  this  side  of  Offenbach 
aright.  The  same  may  be  said  of  England  and 
Germany,  with  the  exception,  so  Eduard  Hanslick 
tells  us,  of  one  theatre  in  Vienna.  Bouffe  actors, 
and  especially  bouffe  actresses,  throw  off  all  re- 
straint, as  a  rule,  as  soon  as  they  leave  Paris.1 
They  seem  to  feel  that  their  finer  deviltry  would 
be  lost  upon  any  but  a  Paris  audience,  and  become 
coarse  and  vulgar  in  consequence.  Any  one  who 
remembers  the  world-wide  difference  between 
Schneider  at  the  Princess's  in  London,  and  Schnei- 
der at  the  Varietes  in  Paris,  will  appreciate  the 
justice  of  this  criticism.3 

1  It  may  be  doubted  whether  Offenbach  opera-bouffe  ever  flourished 
very  brilliantly  in  the  French  provinces ;  at  best,  it  must  have  been  ge- 
nerally looked  upon  as  rather  of  the  nature  of  "  forbidden  fruit "  there. 

3  I  can  not  refrain  now  (1894)  from  adding  a  word  or  two  about  this 
wonderful  artist.  Hortense  Schneider  may  be  looked  back  upon  as  the 
true  living  incarnation  of  Offenbach  opera-bouffe  ;  in  her  way,  she  was 
as  astounding  a  phenomenon  as  Offenbach  himself.  She  had  all  the  at- 
tributes of  a  thoroughly  great  actress  :  personal  beauty  and  grace,  impec- 
cable distinction  of  bearing,  the  most  irresistible  native  vis  comica,  a 
touch  of  very  true  and  searching  pathos,  magnetism,  charm,  vivacity, 
and  a  technique  that  gave  evidence  of  the  most  thorough  schooling.  She 
did  everything  with  the  authority  of  a  master  ;  she  could  skip  with  light- 
ning swiftness  from  queenly  dignity  to  canaille  sauciness,  and  recover 
herself  again  in  a  flash.  Her  lightness  of  touch,  the  keen  delicacy 
of  her  innuendo,  were  incomparable.  To  see  her  Grande  Duchesse, 
when  at  her  best,  was  to  see  an  exquisitely  finished  and  pungent  piece  of 
art.  She  had  her  audience  under  her  thumb,  and  could  do  with  it  what 
she  pleased.  I  remember  one  day,  in  the  winter  of  1890-91,  at  Francisque 
Sarcey's  breakfast-table,  when  the  company  was  composed  of  actors  and 


188  JACQUES   OFFENBACH 

But  it  must  be  acknowledged  that,  clever  as 
Offenbach  was  as  a  humourist,  he  was  still  cleverer 
as  a  musician.  His  musical  faculty  did  not  show 
itself  very  early  in  life,  which  is  somewhat  strange, 
as  men  of  such  absolute  spontaneity  and  origina- 
lity of  musical  invention  commonly  begin  young. 
Offenbach's  father,  who  was  Cantor  at  the  syna- 
gogue in  Cologne,  always  supposed  that  an  elder 
brother,  who  showed  quite  a  pretty  talent  on  the 
violin,  was  to  be  the  musician  of  the  family.  The 
only  talent  the  younger  "  Jakob  "  had  as  a  boy — 
so  a  friend  of  the  family  relates — was  that  of  ba- 
lancing a  lithe  wire  cane  on  the  tip  of  his  nose.  But 
the  music  was  to  come  with  time  ;  and  now  that  we 
can  look  calmly  back  upon  the  man's  career,  we  can 
appreciate  how  unique  his  talent,  or  genius,  was. 

That  nothing  save  Offenbach's  own  well-nigh 
boundless  vanity  could  ever  imagine  that  he 
reached  a  high  musical  plane,  need  hardly  be  said. 
His  musical  "learning"  was  infinitesimal ;  so  soon 
as  he  attempted  any  complex,  or  even  any  serious, 
musical  task,  he  found  himself  pretty  well  at  a 
loss.  In  this  respect  he  resembled  some  of  the  old 
Troubadours, — say,  Adam  de  la  Halle, — who  sang 

actresses  from  many  of  the  Paris  theatres,  socUtaires  and  pensionnaires  of 
the  ComSdie-Franpaise,  managers,  and  dramatic  critics ;  the  conversation 
happened  to  turn  to  Schneider,  whom  I  remembered  well  in  1869-70,  and 
every  one  present,  old  enough  to  remember  her  likewise,  agreed  that  she 
was  a  grande  artiste  in  the  fullest  sense  of  the  term. 


JACQUES   OFFENBACH  189 

as  the  bird  sings  when  they  wrote  songs,  but  made 
a  dire  mess  of  it  when  they  turned  to  counterpoint. 
Yet  in  his  small  way  Offenbach  possessed  a  power 
akin  to  what,  in  a  composer  of  higher  flight,  would 
be  called  a  rare  mastery  over  musical  form.  In 
some  of  his  finales,  many  of  which  are  quite  long, 
he  shows  an  unflagging  power  of  keeping  the  mu- 
sic a-going  that  many  a  contemporary  composer  of 
much  higher  stamp  might  well  have  envied  him. 
The  first  finale  in  la  Perichole,  for  instance,  is 
planned  out  in  quite  a  masterly  way,  and  is  carried 
through  musically  with  infinite  skill.  His  melodic 
invention  was  great,  and  he  seldom  wrote  a  phrase 
that  did  not  bear  the  unmistakable  impress  of  his 
individuality.  That  piquant,  rollicking,  canaille 
rhythm  of  his  has  hardly  ever  been  caught  by  any 
of  his  imitators.  His  melodies  have  been  called 
vulgar ;  well,  compared  with  Mozart's  "  Vol  che 
sapete"  or  "Finch'  han  dal  vino"  they  are.  But 
vulgar  is  rather  a  dull  word  to  apply  to  Offenbach's 
music ;  it  is  too  spirituelle  for  that.  The  word  ca- 
naille, as  opposed  to  bourgeois,  better  expresses  it. 
"  C'est  une  musique  de  saltimlanque,  si  vous  vou- 
lez  ;  mais  ce  n'est  pas  une  musique  d'epicier,"  said 
a  French  critic, — a  phrase  the  subtile  meaning  of 
which  is  wholly  lost  in  English.  Indeed  it  takes 
the  French  language  adequately  to  describe  a  ta- 
lent  so  thoroughly  Parisian  as  Offenbach's.     Per- 


190  JACQUES   OFFENBACH 

haps  I  can  give  the  English-speaking  reader  no 
better  clew  to  its  meaning  than  by  asking  him  to 
compare  the  jiggy  little  melody  in  the  overture 
to  Flotow's  Stradella  with  "  Quand  les  gens  de 
la  noce  "  in  Offenbach's  la  jolie  Parfumeuse.  If 
there  be  one  thing  in  which  Offenbach's  music  is 
more  lacking  than  in  another,  it  is  that  essentially 
mediocre  quality  we  call  respectability  ;  he  was  no 
"  gig-man  ! n  His  music  bears  the  stamp  of  that 
curious  return  to  Arcadian  simplicity  and  freedom 
in  the  midst  of  modern  social  machinery  which  is 
known  as  Bohemianism.  La  vie  de  Boheme,  that 
strange  idyl  in  which  bricks  and  mortar  stand  for 
trees  and  hedges,  asphalt  and  cobble-stones  take 
the  place  of  corn-fields  and  green  meadows,  and 
gas  and  tallow  dips  do  the  work  of  the  eternal 
stars,  breathes  the  peculiar  atmosphere  which  en- 
compasses Offenbach's  melody  ;  it  has  all  its  grace, 
all  its  audacity,  all  its  piquancy.  Zola  speaks  of 
one  of  his  characters  having  "  cette  adorable  lai- 
deur  de  gamine  parisienne," — that  adorable  ugli- 
ness of  the  Parisian  she-ragamuffin  ;  and,  when  we 
are  told  that  Offenbach's  music  is  vulgar,  we  can 
say  that  it  has  all  the  "  adorable  "  canaille  zest  of 
social  Bohemia. 

In  one  respect  Offenbach  was  thoroughly  the 
artist :  he  had  the  true  artist's  conscientiousness 
and  respect  for  his  work.     Those  flippant  little 


JACQUES   OFFENBACH  191 

tunes  of  his,  which  sound  as  if  they  had  sprouted 
from  his  brain  between  a  glass  of  punch  and  a 
cigarette,  represent  a  vast  amount  of  honest 
labour.  We  often  talk  of  spontaneous  inspiration 
as  if  genius  had  nothing  to  do  but  to  let  works  of 
art  flow  out  of  itself  as  water  runs  from  a  hydrant, 
by  simply  turning  a  faucet.  This  is  not  the  way 
genius  works ;  the  germ  of  the  masterpiece  does 
come  spontaneously,  no  one  knows  how  nor  whence ; 
but,  to  make  this  germ  grow,  to  make  the  inspira- 
tion assume  a  worthy  and  organic  shape,  takes 
work.  People  hear  of  the  lazy  ease  with  which 
Rossini  wrote  many  of  his  most  entrancing  compo- 
sitions, and  are  like  to  swoon  with  admiration  at 
such  facility  of  invention.  If  Rossini  really  did 
write  these  things  easily,  the  less  artist  he ;  he 
cheated  the  world  out  of  half  the  legitimate  fruits 
of  his  genius. 

Offenbach  never  tired  of  retouching,  remodel- 
ling, elaborating  his  melodies  until  he  had  got 
them  just  right.  Never  was  composer  more  ear- 
nest in  his  endeavours  exactly  to  suit  his  music  to 
the  dramatic  situation ;  the  melody  and  rhythm 
must  fit  the  text  and  action  to  a  T.  Lucky  that  his 
vanity  led  him  to  take  himself  as  seriously  as  he 
did,  really  to  imagine  himself  a  musical  heavy- 
weight !  Had  he  written  as  flippantly  as  he  was 
destined  to  be  listened  to,  he  would  have  done 


192  JACQUES   OFFENBACH 

nothing  worth  anybody's  notice.  It  was  only  the 
sincerest  work  that  could  produce  music  so  indi- 
vidual, so  piquant,  so  inimitable  as  his.  You  can 
tell  it  anywhere.  His  imitators,  Herve  and  Le- 
cocq,  are  better  musicians  than  he  ;  but  they  have 
not  caught  his  accent,  nor  reproduced  the  snap  of 
his  rhythms  ;  his  exquisite  sense  of  humour  is  fo- 
reign to  their  writings.  When  they  parody  a  great 
composer  they  give  us  a  clever  imitation  at  best ; 
but  when  Offenbach  caricatures  the  style  of  some 
famous  man,  we  well-nigh  roll  on  the  ground  with 
laughter.  There  is  nothing  funnier  in  all  music 
than  some  of  the  passages  in  which  he  hits  off 
Meyerbeer.  What  musician  with  a  grain  of  hu- 
mour in  his  composition  can  hear  the  recitative, 
"  Que  veut  dire  ce  double  cri  9  "  and  the  ensuing 
chorus  on  two  contrasted  themes,  "  Ah  !  la  bonne 
aubaine"  in  the  last  act  of  les  Brigands,  without 
laughing  heartily  ?  It  turns  the  ponderously 
dramatic  Meyerbeer  inside  out !  How  the  good 
Herold  would  have  roared  to  hear  the  wild  fun 
Offenbach  pokes  at  his  overture  to  Zampa  in  le 
Corsaire  noir  !  But,  apart  from  this  sort  of  par- 
ody, Offenbach  could  be  funny  in  other  ways; 
take  the  first  finale  in  la  Pericliole  as  an  example. 
Sometimes,  to  be  sure,  his  fun  is  rather  cheap  and 
tricky  ;  as  in  the  ensemble-piece  in  the  second  act 
of  la  Perichole,  where,  half  for  the  ridiculousness 


JACQUES   OFFENBACH  193 

of  the  thing,  half  to  fill  out  the  rhythm  of  his 
music,  he  splits  up  u  au  cachot  qu'on  reserve  aux 
maris  recalcitrants  "  into  : 

Aux  maris  r«-,  aux  maris  cat-, 
Aux  maris  ci-,  aux  maris  trants, 
Aux  maris  recalcitrants ! 

But  he  does  not  descend  to  this  sort  of  thing 
often  ;  his  fun  usually  resides  either  in  his  music 
itself,  or  else  in  the  way  it  adds  point  and  zest  to 
the  humour  of  the  text  or  situation.  Still,  al- 
though undeniably  great  as  a  musical  humourist, 
Offenbach's  genius  shows  itself  most  strikingly  in 
his  cleverness  as  a  caricaturist.  Of  his  power  in 
the  field  of  caricature  and  parody  Ambros  says  : — 

"  The  French,  are  masters  in  this  sort  of  comic  production 
(think,  for  instance,  of  Grandville's  drawings  and  the  well- 
known  busts  by  Dantan,  among  a  host  of  others),  and  Offen- 
bach has  caught  their  idea  and  applied  it  to  music.  This 
decided,  and  surely  by  no  means  despicable,  talent  with 
which  Offenbach  was  endowed,  and  has  cultivated  in  the  fit- 
test place  in  the  world,  namely,  in  Paris,  has  led  him,  even 
in  his  choice  of  subjects,  to  enter  upon  a  path  in  which  this 
talent  of  his  can  exercise  itself  in  the  most  brilliant  manner. 
Rossini's  Doctor  Bartolo  is  really  a  second  Cato  when  brought 
into  comparison  with  the  mad-cap  figures  that  go  rollicking 
about  in  Barbe-Bleu,  la  Grande  Duchesse  de  Gerolstein,  or  la 
Princesse  de  Trebvzonde.  We  may  shake  our  heads  never  so 
suspiciously  in  the  midst  of  this  mad  world  of  grimaces,  in 
this  antic  carnival  of  the  mind,  but  we  can  not  help  feeling 
13 


194  JACQUES   OFFENBACH 

cheerfully  stimulated,  and  the  accusation  we  are  on  the 
point  of  making  is  stifled  in  the  unquenchable  laughter  into 
which  we  break  out  in  spite  of  ourselves.  These  musical 
farces  have,  after  all,  a  significance  of  their  own  as  works  of 
art,  in  the  history  of  music  ;  by  which  I  do  not  mean  to  say 
they  are  classic  music  of  permanent  value.  Offenbach  is  an 
original,  and,  if  not  precisely  praiseworthy,  nor  in  any  way 
a  model  for  general  imitation,  he  is  yet  a  remarkable  phe- 
nomenon of  his  kind." 


Offenbach's  career,  like  that  of  some  other  great 
men,  may  be  divided  into  three  periods.  As  a 
young  man,  he  wrote  opera  after  opera,  without 
succeeding  in  finding  favour  in  the  eyes  of  any 
Paris  manager.  In  desperation  he  set  up  a  little 
theatre  of  his  own  in  the  Champs-Elysees,  in  1855 
(the  year  of  the  International  Exhibition),  at 
which  he  produced  a  host  of  one-act  pieces.  It 
was  a  lucky  move  on  his  part ;  for  he  at  last  hit 
upon  a  style  wholly  congenial  to  his  peculiar 
talent,  and  his  recognition  by  the  public  dates 
from  this  year.  Le  Mariage  aux  Lanternes, 
Monsieur  et  Madame  Denis,  la  Chanson  de  For- 
tunio,  les  deux  Aveugles,  and  other  things  of  the 
sort,  earned  him  quite  a  solid  reputation.  His 
possible  dangerous  side  had  not  yet  shown  it- 
self, and  he  won  ready  recognition  from  musi- 
cians ;  Rossini,  the  man  of  all  others  to  detect  the 
pure  gold  in  his  talent,  laughingly  dubbed  him 


JACQUES   OFFENBACH  195 

u  the  Mozart  of  the  Champs-Elysees."    Hanslick 


"  Of  all  Offenbach's  works,  the  group  of  one-act  pieces  in- 
terspersed with  songs,  with  their  irresistible  humour  and 
perfect  form,  please  us  to  day  more  than  any  others.  How 
many  potentates  of  la  haute  critique  would  not  fain  persuade 
themselves  and  others  that  such  trifles  are  easily  written ! 
Yes,  so  they  are  for  one  gifted  by  the  grace  of  God.  But 
why  is  this  gift  so  rare  ?  " 

It  was  with  the  works  of  his  second  period — 
which  may  be  roughly  dated  as  beginning  with  the 
year  1860 — that  Offenbach  really  founded  the  spe- 
cies of  nmsico-dramatic  art  known  as  opera-bouffe. 
In  1858  his  OrpMe  aux  Enfers  was  brought  out  at 
the  Theatre  des  Bouffes-Parisiens,  and  with  this, 
la  Belle  Helene,  Barbe-Bleue,  Genevieve  de  Bra- 
bant, la  Grande  Duchesse  de  Gerolstein  (Theatre 
des  VarietSs,  1867),  and  other  works  he  entered 
upon  larger  musical  and  comic  domain.  The  de- 
velopment of  his  style  was  quite  proportionate  to 
the  growth  of  his  task  ;  in  these  operas  his  power 
as  a  caricaturist  shows  itself  in  all  its  glory.  To 
quote  Ambros  once  more  : 

"Offenbach,  with  the  peculiar  tendency  of  his  talent,  has 
trod  the  field  of  parody  con  amore  and,  considering  his  suc- 
cess with  the  public,  with  very  firm  step.  The  antique 
world  of  the  gods  (Orpheus),  the  world  of  Heroes  (Helen), 
the  Arcadian  Shepherd- world  (Daphnis  and  Chloe),  mediae- 


196  JACQUES   OFFENBACH 

val  Romance  (Genevieve),  even  specifically  Venetian  Ro- 
mance (Bridge  of  Sighs),  have  all  had  to  submit  to  being  led 
up  to  his  distorting  mirror,  and  to  grin  back  upon  us  in 
comically  grotesque  grimaces.  The  matter  is  not  so  unsus- 
picious and  innocent  as  it  looks.  All  the  material  which 
artists  have  hitherto  turned  to  account,  in  which  they  have 
sought  their  ideals,  is  here  pushed  ad  absurdum  ;  we  feel  as 
if  Mephisto,  under  the  elegant  mask  of  a  '  man  of  the  times,' 
were  sardonically  smiling  at  us,  and  asking  us  if  the  whole 
bag  and  baggage  of  antiquity  and  romance  be  really  worth 
a  rap.  Offenbach  has  not  yet  parodied  Dante's  Divina  Corn- 
media  ;  but  who  knows  what  may  come  to  pass  ?  What  will 
be  left  for  him  to  do,  if  a  tabula  rasa  is  made  in  this  fash- 
ion ?  As  a  last  resort,  the  jubilant  can  can,  which  exultingly 
throws  up  its  legs  toward  the  Heaven  to  which  others  raise 
their  arms  in  adoration  ;  or,  there  still  remains  something 
'positive,'  la  vie  parisienne,  which,  by  the  way,  Offenbach 
has  also  set  to  music." 

It  is  quite  true  that  these  operas-bouffes  of  Of- 
fenbach's second  period  are  as  attackable  on  the 
ground  of  art  ethics  as  they  are  on  a  basis  of  ge- 
neral morality.  If  there  is  abundant  excellent 
humour  in  them,  the  element  of  caricature  they 
contain  is  essentially  cynical,  unbelieving,  and 
irreverent ;  you  feel  in  them  that  the  composer — 
let  alone  the  librettists  —  holds  nothing  sacred. 
And,  though  the  caricature  is  astonishingly  bril- 
liant, it  does  leave  a  questionable  taste  in  the 
mouth.  One  can  almost  agree  with  the  Augs- 
burger  allgemeine  Zeitung  that 


JACQUES   OFFENBACH  197 

u  The  Egyptian  plague  of  the  century  has  been  Sardou's 
and  Offenbach's  muse  :  the  sensuous  destruction  of  taste 
through  a  vulgarity  of  the  stage  that  is  fast  becoming  classic  !" 

About  1870,  that  is,  after  la  Grande  Duchesse, 
Offenbach  grew  less  grotesque  in  his  travesties, 
and  evidently  began  to  aim  at  higher  things.  It 
is  here  that  his  third  period  begins.  He  did  not 
wholly  give  up  his  whilom  spirit  of  fantastic  cari- 
cature, but  it  was  no  longer  the  prime  moving 
power  in  his  work.  The  first  few  operas  of  this 
period  are  thoroughly  charming.  Such  are  la 
Perichole  (which  belongs  to  his  third  period  by  its 
character,  if  not  quite  by  its  date,  1868),  laPrin- 
cesse  de  Tr'ebizonde,  la  Vie  parisienne  (in  which  he 
relapses  somewhat  into  his  second  manner),  and, 
above  all,  Vert-  Vert,  to  my  mind  his  most  entirely 
delightful  work.  When  he  tried  to  mount  still 
higher  in  the  scale,  as  in  Barhouf  (1860)  and 
Robinson  Crusoe  (1867),  he  failed  signally ;  he 
could  not  walk  securely  in  the  higher  forms  of 
composition.  Almost  as  disastrous  were  his  at- 
tempts at  combining  opera-bouffe  with  the  spec- 
tacular ballet  -  drama  of  the  Black  Crook  sort. 
Such  hybrid  forms  as  his  remodelled  version  of 
Orphee  aux  Enfers  (written  for  the  new  Theatre 
de  la  Gaite  in  1874),  Fantasio,  la  Boule  de  Neige, 
le  Corsaire  noir  (written  for  Vienna  in  1872),  and 
le  Roi  Carotte  are  hardly  worthy  of  his  genius ; 


198  JACQUES   OFFENBACH 

for  one  thing,  the  libretti  were  out  of  his  peculiar 
vein.  There  is,  however,  much  charming  music 
in  these  operas ;  once,  indeed,  in  le  Roi  Carotte, 
he  almost  rises  to  the  impressive  pitch,  in  the 
quartet  among  the  ruins  of  Pompeii : 

"  D6bris  dont  l'aspect  nous  transports 
Aux  grands  jours  dun  peuple  efface  I " 

The  duet  of  peddlers,  "  Nous  venous  du  fin  fond 
de  la  Perse,"  in  the  same  opera  is  enchantingly 
graceful,  and  he  has  perhaps  never  shown  more 
irresistible  verve  and  entrain  than  in  the  railway 
song,  "  La  locomotive." 

Les  Brigands  (1869)  is  an  almost  complete  re- 
turn to  his  second  manner,  after  la  Perichole,  al- 
beit some  numbers  in  it  are  quite  elaborate.  It,  as 
well  as  most  of  his  latest  works,  shows  how  well 
Offenbach  appreciated  his  real  power.  If  in  these 
operas,  la  jolie  Parfumeuse  (1873),  Madame 
VArcliiduc  (1874),  la  Boulanglre  a  des  'ecus 
(1875),  Madame  Favart  (1878),  la  Fille  du  Tam- 
bour-Major (1879),  and  one  or  two  others,  he 
shows  signs  of  his  spring  of  melody  running  dry, 
he  only  plagiarized  himself ;  he  remained  original 
to  the  end,  always  unique  and  inimitable. 

"What  makes  Offenbach's  future  popularity — 
what  we  call  his  "  immortality  " — very  question- 
able is  the  unfortunate  fact  that  the  special  pub- 


JACQUES  OFFENBACH  199 

lie  for  whom  he  wrote  really  cared  more  for  the 
"  game-flavour "  in  his  operas  than  for  their 
music,  or  their  intrinsic  comicality.  People  who 
go  to  the  theatre  in  this  frame  of  mind  must  be 
continually  served  with  novelties.  Thus  Offen- 
bach, even  before  his  death,  had  begun  to  go  out 
of  fashion  in  Paris,  and  his  inferior  imitators  are 
now  more  successful  with  the  public  than  he — 
they  are  newer  !  And  if  Offenbach  is  looked  upon 
coldly  at  headquarters,  there  is  but  little  hope  for 
his  enduring  popularity  elsewhere.  His  operas- 
bouffes  are  "  suspicious "  articles  at  best ;  and 
their  music  is  too  firmly  wedded  to  the  text  to 
hope  to  live  apart  from  it. 


TWO    MODEKN    CLASSICISTS 


TWO    MODERN    CLASSICISTS 

"  Quot  homines,  tot  sententm  "  is  a  saw  the  ap- 
plication of  which  might  well  be  extended  beyond 
its  current  limits.  It  is  not  only  upon  our  opi- 
nions that  we  can  not  escape  setting  at  least  a  faint 
stamp  of  our  own  individuality, — though  this  im- 
press may  often  seem  obliterated  by  our  modes  of 
expressing  them, — but  our  understanding,  our  per- 
ceptions, our  very  seeing  and  hearing  are  inde- 
feasibly  and  inveterately  our  own.  Language  is 
at  best  a  makeshift  by  which  we  seek  to  impart 
to  others  an  approximate  notion  of  our  meaning ; 
but,  use  it  as  we  may,  there  is  always  room  for 
doubt  as  to  whether  we  have  really  made  ourselves 
understood.  That  which  we  call  a  word  is  but 
the  shadow  of  our  thought ;  it  may  mean  this  to 
us,  but  that  to  another.  Written  language,  un- 
aided as  it  is  by  the  plastic  imagery  of  gesture  and 
the  innuendo  of  emphasis,  is  an  especially  rough 
tool ;  we  write  a  word,  and  every  reader  makes  of 
it  what  he  can — lucky  for  us  if  he  have  the  ho- 
nesty not  to  make  of  it  what  he  please  !    The  idea- 


204  TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS 

conveying  force  of  the  word  will  be  what  it  means 
to  him,  not  what  it  means  to  us.  If  we  would  be 
distinctly  understood,  we  must  beat  about  the  bush 
and  explain  ourselves ;  our  word,  left  to  itself, 
will  have  as  many  meanings  as  there  are  men  who 
read  it. 

But,  to  quit  generalities  and  come  down  to  a 
definite  point,  how  many  different  meanings  in  as 
many  minds  has  not  this  one  word  "  classicism  I" 
Classic,  classicism,  classicist,  have  grown  to  be 
very  vague  terms.  To  those  who  look  for  the 
meaning  of  a  word  in  its  etymology  they  are  im- 
pregnated with  a  flavour  of  the  academy,  they  reek 
with  associations  with  the  categorical  imperative, 
the  "  Thou  shalt"  and  "  Thou  shalt  not"  of  the 
schools.  To  others  they  convey  an  idea  of  au- 
thority based  on  a  survival  after  long  sifting  and 
a  gradual  recognition  of  what  is  fine,  worthy,  and, 
as  the  Germans  say,  mustergiltig.  To  others, 
again,  they  imply  merely  something  old,  that  was 
doubtless  admirable  once,  but  has  had  its  day  like 
other  dogs,  and  should  by  rights  be  obsolete  now. 
And  who  shall  say  that  any  of  these  interpreta- 
tions is  wholly  without  warrant  ?  What  we  call  a 
"  classic  *  has  become  so  in  virtue  of  being  recog- 
nized as  fine  and  worthy  by  successive  generations, 
and  should  be  looked  upon  as  a  model  in  its  way, 
as  far  as  it  goes ;  being  a  model,  it  naturally  has 


TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS  205 

been  held  up  as  such  by  the  schools,  and  departure 
from  its  scheme  has  been  deprecated,  with  more 
or  less  reason.  Again,  as  it  is  of  necessity  old, 
inspired  by  the  afflatus  of  a  time  when  the  con- 
ditions of  life,  thought,  and  even  emotion  were 
different  from  ours,  when  men  had  other  ideals 
than  ours,  is  there  not  unavoidably  an  element  of 
obsolescence  in  it  ?  May  we  not  assume  that  its 
mature  growth,  like  all  mature  growth,  has  brought 
with  it  the  potentiality  of  decay  ?  All  these  mean- 
ings of  ' '  classic  "  and  "  classicism  "  have  truth  in 
them  ;  it  is  only  by  holding  too  fast  by  one,  to  the 
exclusion  of  the  others,  that  we  run  the  risk  of 
error. 

Yet,  although  these  interpretations  of  the  word 
"classicism"  are  all  more  or  less  true,  they  are 
still  too  general  and  vague  for  my  present  purpose. 
If  I  have  dwelt  on  them  at  all,  it  was  to  ward  off 
at  the  outset  any  prejudice,  any  foregone  conclu- 
sion, in  the  mind  of  my  readers — either  in  the  way 
of  partisanship  or  opposition,  pro  or  con —  by 
showing  that  no  single  one  of  them  covers  the 
whole  ground ;  and  that,  consequently,  so  soon  as 
we  hold  fast  by  the  special  truth  contained,  or  im- 
plied in  one,  discarding  that  implied  in  the  others, 
we  thereby  place  our  chosen  truth  as  it  were  in 
vacuo,  thus  inviting  error  to  flow  in  and  surround 
it.     I  would  address  myself  here  neither  to  the 


206  TWO  MODERN  CLASSICISTS 

enthusiasm  of  the  so-called  classicist,  nor  to  the 
militant  scorn  of  the  modern  come-onter  ;  I  would 
as  far  as  possible  paint  a  faithful  picture  of  some- 
thing that  has  been  and  the  true  significance  of 
which  seems  to  me  of  lasting  importance. 

To  my  present  purpose  neither  the  authority, 
the  Mustergiltigheit  ("model- worthiness"),  nor 
the  age  and  possible  obsolescence  of  musical  clas- 
sicism is  of  any  consequence  whatever ;  I  wish  to 
look  at  the  subject  from  a  totally  different  point 
of  view.  I  would  specify  what  the  true  gist,  fhe 
quintessence  in  the  last  analysis,  of  musical  clas- 
sicism was  in  its  heyday,  apart  from  all  definitions, 
with  all  that  was  merely  external  and  unessential 
eliminated.  "What  I  speak  of  is  an  aesthetic  point 
of  view  which  history  shows  us  was  "the  dominant 
one  during  the  periods  in  wliich  the  great  master- 
pieces were  written  which  are  by  common  consent 
called  classic  to-day.  And,  in  examining  this 
point  of  view,  I  trust  far  less  to  the  evidence  fur- 
nished by  anything  of  the  didactic  sort  written  or 
read  during  the  periods  to  which  I  refer  than  to 
the  internal  evidence  of  the  master-works  them- 
selves. 

If  it  be  true  of  any  art  that  its  real  essence  is 
the  expression  of  emotion,  this  is  doubly  true  of 
the  art  of  music.  And  it  may  be  well  to  state 
here  that  in  all  epochs  in  the  history  of  music 


TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS  207 

which  have  since  been  rated  as  classic — the  great 
Italian  period  of  strict  vocal  counterpoint,  from 
the  immediate  forerunners  of  Palestrina,  the  two 
Gabrielis,  and  Orlando  Lasso  down  to  such  de- 
cadents as  Orazio  Benevoli  (a  period  extending 
from  early  in  the  sixteenth  century  to  near  the 
close  of  the  seventeenth) ;  the  great  "Neapolitan" 
period  of  opera  and  oratorio  writing,  from  Ales- 
sandro  Scarlatti  down  to  Pergolesi  and  Sarti ;  and 
the  great  German  period,  from  Sebastian  Bach  and 
Handel  down  to  Beethoven — the  art  of  music  was 
unhesitatingly  looked  upon  as  distinctly  an  inde- 
pendent art.  The  idea  that  music  was  an  art  im- 
mediately dependent  on  poetry  was  that  of  the 
ancient  Greeks  ;  it  cropped  up  again  for  a  while  un- 
der the  Florentine  Music  Reform  of  the  early  part 
of  the  seventeenth  century,  and  has  since  made  its 
reappearance  with  Richard  Wagner ;  but  it  had 
absolutely  nothing  to  do  with  any  period  or  school 
generally  or  properly  known  as  classic.  In  all 
classic  epochs  the  art  of  music  was  regarded  as  an 
art  by  itself,  following  its  own  course  of  develop- 
ment, and  subject  to  its  own  inherent  laws.  This 
was  one  part  of  the  classic  point  of  view ;  it  was 
axiomatic.  But,  based  on  this  axiom,  the  true 
quintessence  of  the  classic  point  of  view  was  this  : 
that  in  music — as  in  the  other  fine  arts — the  ex- 
pression of  emotion  must  be  realized  through  per- 


208  TWO   MODERN"   CLASSICISTS 

feet  beauty  of  form  and  a  finely  and  stoutly  orga- 
nized construction.  The  recognition  of  the  indis- 
pensableness  of  this,  so  to  speak,  "architectural" 
side  of  music  was  the  most  distinctive  and  charac- 
teristic mark  of  the  classical  point  of  view  ;  as  I 
have  said,  it  is  the  very  quintessence  of  classicism. 
It  is  in  this  sense,  and  in  this  sense  alone,  that 
I  shall  use  the  words  classic,  classicism,  and  classi- 
cist in  the  present  essay.  In  contradistinction  to 
classicism,  I  would  take  musical  "romanticism" 
to  imply  the  aim  to  express  emotion  in  music  by 
more  or  less  picturesque  and  suggestive  means,  by 
the  imitation  or  suggestion  of  natural  (extra-musi- 
cal) modes  of  expression,  in  short,  by  any  means 
in  the  power  of  the  art  not  necessarily  connected 
with  beauty  of  form  and  stoutness  or  symmetry  of 
organic  structure.  By  this  I  do  not  mean  that 
the  modes  of  expression  peculiarly  characteristic 
of  musical  romanticism  are  necessarily  inimical  to 
or  discrepant  with  beauty  of  form  or  stoutness  and 
symmetry  of  organism  ;  the  two  circles  of  connota- 
tion of  "classicism"  and  "romanticism"  may  in- 
tersect, and  a  certain  domain  be  common  to  both  ; 
the  two  elements  may  pull  together  toward  one 
and  the  same  artistic  goal.  But,  for  the  sake  of 
clearness,  I  here  limit  the  meaning  of  each  of  the 
two  terms  to  that  which  is  distinctively  character- 
istic, and  hence  essential,  in  it.     I  take  classicism 


TWO   MODEPwX   CLASSICISTS  209 

to  imply  the  endeavour  to  express  emotion  mu- 
sically through  beauty  of  form  and  stoutness  and 
symmetry  of  organic  construction ;  romanticism, 
the  endeavour  to  express  emotion  by  other  musical 
means,  for  the  present  no  matter  what. 

The  last  great  classic  master  in  music,  univer- 
sally recognized  as  such,  was  Felix  Mendelssohn. 
It  is  true  that  he  was  more  famous  in  his  own  day, 
and  is  to  a  great  extent  so  still,  as  a  romanticist 
than  as  a  classicist ;  indeed  he  was  both.  But  he 
was  distinctly  a  classicist  jusqu'au  bout  des  ongles  ; 
strongly  romantic  as  his  native  bent  was,  and  full 
rein  as  he  gave  it  for  his  time,  he  never  indulged 
it  at  the  expense  of  his  classicism.  With  all  his 
imaginative  romanticism,  he  was  and  remains  the 
last  world-famous  classic  composer,  so  far.  His 
classicism  and  romanticism  went  hand  in  hand, 
and  were,  like  Sebastian  Bach's,  in  perfect  equi- 
librium. Eobert  Schumann  can  not  compare  with 
him  in  this  respect ;  with  Schumann  the  romantic 
side  preponderated  over  the  classic.  Even  if  we 
admit  that  his  artistic  aims  may  have  been  as  clas- 
sic in  spirit  as  Mendelssohn's — which  a  careful 
study  of  his  works  gives  some  reason  for  believing 
— the  accident  of  lacking  early  training  made  him 
far  less  in  condition  to  compass  them  than  Men- 
delssohn, whose  technical  musical  education  was 


210  TWO  MODERN   CLASSICISTS 

phenomenally  thorough.  Perfection  of  mnsical 
form  was  something  that  Schumann  always  had 
to  struggle  for ;  with  Mendelssohn  it  was  a  second 
nature. 

But  if  Mendelssohn  was  the  last  universally  re- 
cognized great  musical  classicist,  there  were  two 
men,  younger  than  he  and  less  widely  famous, 
whose  lives  were  intimately  associated  with  musi- 
cal life  in  Boston,  whose  memory  is  green  in  the 
hearts  of  many  of  us,  and  in  whom  the  spirit  of 
the  truest  classicism  still  breathed  in  as  perfect 
purity  as  in  Mendelssohn  himself :  Robert  Franz 
and  Otto  Dresel.  They  were  stanch  and  life-long 
friends ;  their  agreement  on  musical  subjects  was 
as  complete  as  their  friendship  ;  they  both  worked 
together  toward  the  same  end,  though  they  lived 
long  apart ;  neither  of  the  two  gave  anything  to 
the  world  without  its  passing  through  the  ordeal 
of  the  other's  criticism  ;  they  died  within  two  years 
of  each  other.  It  is  well  to  speak  of  them  to- 
gether. 

In  both  of  these  men  was  to  be  found,  in  its 
highest  perfection,  what  I  will  call,  for  lack  of  a  bet- 
ter name,  the  sense  for  musical  beauty ;  the  keen- 
est sense  for  beauty  of  expression,  beauty  of  form, 
proportion,  and  colour.  And,  so  strong  was  this 
sense  in  them,  so  imperative  in  its  demands,  that 
neither  of  them  could  be  content  unless  the  whole 


TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS  211 

of  his  sense  for  beauty  was  satisfied.  Beauty  of 
form  alone  was  not  enough  for  them ;  truth  and 
poignancy  of  expression,  divorced  from  beauty  of 
form,  left  them  with  the  feeling  that  something 
indispensable  was  lacking ;  beauty  of  detail  —  in 
melody,  harmony,  or  modulation — left  them  cold, 
unless  there  were  also  coherency  of  development 
and  symmetry  of  design.  Without  beauty  of  co- 
lour (a  beautiful  quality  of  tone)  their  delight  in 
music  was  sorely  marred.  For  them  music  must 
fulfil  all  the  demands  a  complete  and  spherical 
aesthetic  sense  could  make  upon  it.  I  must  own 
that  I  was  rather  surprised  to  find  in  Dresel — whom 
I  knew  personally  and  intimately,  for  with  Franz  I 
had  only  two  or  three  years'  intercourse  by  letter 
— so  keen  a  delight  in  musical  colour,  to  find  him 
make  such  severe  demands  upon  music  in  this  re- 
spect. In  Boston  he  had  the  name  of  being  rather 
"grim"  in  his  tastes,  and  I  knew  his  sense  for 
form  was  so  keen  and  fastidious  that  I  thought  it 
likely  enough  his  demands  upon  beauty  of  clang- 
tint  might  be  less  exorbitant.  But  no  :  a  disa- 
greeable voice,  a  dry-toned  pianoforte,  a  poor  vio- 
lin, unbeautif ul  orchestration,  offended  his  ear  as 
unpardonably  as  it  could  that  of  the  veriest  colour- 
epicure  in  music;  Paderewski  himself  could  not 
surpass  him  in  fineness  of  musical  colour-sense. 
And  speaking  of  the  great  Polish  pianist  (whom, 


212  TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS 

by  the  way,  he  never  heard)  reminds  me  of  some- 
thing I  heard  Dresel  say  one  day,  in  talking  of 
pianoforte  playing : 

' '  I  have  heard  almost  all  the  great  pianists  ;  but 
of  the  whole  lot  I  can  think  of  only  two  whom  I 
should  call  really  remarkable  for  beauty  of  touch  : 
Thalberg  and  Kubinstein." 

"How  about  Gottschalk  ?"  I  suggested. 

"  Ah  !  yes,  I  had  forgotten  him  ;  he  certainly 
belongs  with  the  other  two  ;  his  tone  on  the  pi- 
anoforte was  phenomenally  fine  !  " 

In  a  similar  way  I  was  somewhat  surprised  at 
first  at  the  high  value  he  set  upon  emotional  ex- 
pressiveness in  music,  especially  upon  the  expres- 
sion of  individual  emotion,  upon  the  emotional 
personality  and  temperament  of  a  composer.  To 
be  sure,  these  surprises  came  at  a  time  when  I 
knew  him  far  less  well  than  I  did  afterwards,  near 
the  beginning  of  our  musical  friendship,  when  I 
still  had  to  take  him  largely  for  what  his  reputa- 
tion with  music-lovers  in  general  painted  him  to 
be — something  of  a  "  dry  "  musical  formalist.  Yet 
even  after  I  had  become  better  acquainted  with 
the  emotional,  romantic  side  of  his  nature,  there 
were  certain  points  in  him  that  I  still  failed  to 
understand ;  points  which  seemed  to  me  not  to 
harmonize  well  with  the  rest  of  him.  Indeed, 
to  his  death,  I  could  never  explain  the  to  me  ex- 


TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS  213 

traordinarily  cool  attitude  he  assumed  toward 
Gluck's  operas  and  the  works  of  the  older  Italian 
contrapuntists,  Palestrina,  the  Naninis,  and  others 
of  that  school.  The  Gluck  matter,  to  be  sure,  did 
not  trouble  me  overmuch ;  but,  as  for  Palestrina 
and  his  contemporaries,  it  seemed  to  me  to  border 
on  the  illogical  for  an  ardent  Bach  and  Handel 
worshipper  like  Dresel  to  ignore  this  older  music, 
which  was  really  one  of  the  main  foundations  of 
the  great  Germans'  art.  I  never  could  get  him  to 
talk  long  enough  on  the  subject,  which  evidently 
did  not  interest  him  in  the  least,  to  give  me  any 
clue  to  his  inexplicable  feelings  in  the  matter.  It 
was  only  after  his  death  that  Franz,  to  whom  I 
had  written  on  the  subject,  suggested  an  explana- 
tion that  made  me  begin  to  see  clearly  into  it.  In 
a  letter  dated  October  31,  1890,  Franz  answered 
my  questions  as  follows  : 

"  The  questions  you  ask  are  not  easy  to  answer.  But  I 
would  remark  before  all  things  that  it  can  not  he  required 
of  a  musician  to  bring  an  equal  interest  to  bear  upon  aU  art- 
phenomena,  a  requirement  which  is  no  doubt  a  conditio  sine 
qua  nori  for  the  historian,  not  for  the  musician,  for  a  life- 
time would  hardly  suffice  for  the  intensive  study  of  them. 
Friend  Dresel  was,  to  be  sure,  guilty  of  many  a  harshness  in 
his  judgments,  which  unfortunately  led  superficial  people 
to  charge  him  with  one-sided  narrowness.  I  myself  have 
not  fared  better  !  I  never  had  any  talk  with  Dresel  about 
his  attitude  toward  Gluck  and  the  old  Italian  school,  so  I  am 


214  TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS 

in  no  condition  to  give  jou  any  information  about  his  aver- 
sion. Yet  I  can  very  well  imagine  that  he  did  not  sympa- 
thize with  the  frequent  over-estimates  of  Gluck's  artistic 
expression.  The  somewhat  cold  objectiveness  to  which  the 
subjects  he  treated  forced  this  master  could  not  possibly  be 
sympathetic  to  so  subjectively  disposed  an  individual  as 
Dresel  unquestionably  was — his  cool  sympathy  is  only  thus 
to  be  explained.  He  seems  to  have  assumed  a  similar,  per- 
haps a  harsher,  attitude  toward  the  old  Italian  school.  In 
it  the  personal  element  withdraws  almost  wholly  into  the 
background,  and  is  overwhelmed  by  the  demands  of  the 
Catholic  Church,  which,  as  you  know,  does  not  consider 
the  individual  of  any  account.  The  expression  of  the  mas- 
ters of  this  school  thus  became  so  typical  that  one  has 
some  difficulty  in  distinguishing  between,  for  example, 
the  grand  works  of  Palestrina.  It  was  Protestantism  that 
first  loosed  musicians'  tongues  ;  for  in  it  the  personal  ele- 
ment, in  contradistinction  to  the  typical,  gets  its  rights. 
The  musical  culmination  of  the  liberated  spirits  is  to  be  dis- 
cerned in  Bach  and  Handel — in  both  of  them  does  the  '  Ego ' 
celebrate  its  most  brilliant  triumphs.  Nowadays  we  are  told 
to  fall  back  solely  upon  ourselves,  a  fact  which  has  already 
led  to  a  subjectivism  that  makes  one's  flesh  creep.  In  my 
opinion  the  individual  element  should  subordinate  itself  to 
the  universal,  in  which  the  artistic  spirit  of  the  noblest  sort 
attains  to  self -consciousness  ;  and  here  it  finds  its  limit.  He 
who  disregards  this  limit  will  sooner  or  later  come  to  grief. 
The  great  crowd  that  rule  the  roast  to-day  should  naturally 
be  sharply  distinguished  from  this  '  universal ; '  for  them 
everything  is  sensual  pleasure,  and  they  have  no  inkling  of 
a  katharsis  in  which,  and  in  which  alone,  the  true  blessings 
of  art  are  realized.     After  the  crowd  was  emancipated,  even 


TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS  215 

in  its  relations  to  music,     .     .     .     then  began  the  downfall, 
about  which  only  blindness  can  have  any  doubts. 

"These  cursory  remarks  to  a  certain  extent  explain 
Dresel's  attitude.  His  negative  judgment  on  Gluck  and  the 
old  Italian  school  is  but  the  outcome  of  a  passionately  mobile 
inner  nature,  for  which,  in  neither  case,  does  the  blood  pul- 
sate quickly  enough,  and  one  that  could  not  possibly  come 
to  an  understanding  with  the  false  objectiveness  of  our  doc- 
trinarians. Dresel's  opposition  to  the  neo- Germanic  school, 
too,  has  its  interesting  side.  Its  intolerance  of  all  barriers 
{Hire  Schrankerilodgkeit)  was  necessarily  antipathetic  to  his 
measure-loving  nature  ;  in  which  matter  he  may  perhaps 
now  and  then  have  overshot  the  mark." 

I  quote  this  merely  to  show  that  Dresel  was  very- 
far  from  being  the  "dry  formalist "  in  music  that 
many  thought  him.  In  truth,  the  romantic  side 
of  his  nature  was  as  fully  developed  as  that  in  any 
of  the  musical  "new  lights"  of  to-day  ;  only  with 
him  it  went  hand  in  hand  with,  and  was  counter- 
poised by,  an  equally  well  developed  spirit  of  clas- 
sicism. And  what  was  true  of  Dresel  in  this  re- 
spect was  quite  as  true  of  Franz ;  in  many  of  his 
long  musical  talks  with  me,  the  former  continually 
quoted  Franz,  not  as  authority,  but  to  show  that 
he  himself  was  not  alone  in  his  views. 

What  separates  the  classicism,  the  sense  for 
beauty  of  musical  form  and  proportion,  of  Franz 
and  Dresel  from  that  of  almost  all  "classicists" 
to-day  —  and  the  spirit  of  musical  classicism,  if 


216  .TWO   MODEEN   CLASSICISTS 

possibly  obsolescent,  is  by  no  means  quite  so  dead 
yet  as  some  persons  would  have  us  believe — what 
made  them,  in  a  sense,  the  last  of  the  Mohicans  of 
a  now  by-gone  period,  is  more  a  difference  in  kind 
than  in  degree.  I  do  not  think  it  any  exaggera- 
tion to  say  that  their  perfect  purity,  chasteness, 
and  nice  discrimination  of  specifically  musical 
sense  are  now  a  thing  of  the  past.  Our  musical 
instincts  nowadays  run  in  other  channels ;  we  fol- 
low other  ideals,  and  are  not  only  willing,  but 
eager,  to  sacrifice  things  to  them  that  our  fathers 
would  not  have  consented  to  forego.  For  the 
absolute  fineness  and  delicacy  of  musical  sense 
of  Bach,  Handel,  Haydn,  Mozart,  Beethoven, 
Cherubini,  and  Mendelssohn,  we  have  no  doubt 
substituted  something  else ;  we  can  stand  things 
— ay,  and  take  delight  in  them,  too — that  would 
have  set  their  teeth  on  edge ;  we  can  find  a  certain 
ideal  coherency,  of  mood,  poetic  or  dramatic  pur- 
pose, or  emotional  expression,  in  things  that  would 
doubtless  have  struck  them  as  utterly  chaotic.  I 
am  not  even  prepared  to  deny  that  our  modern 
musical  sense  may  have,  or  may  be  developing 
into  acquiring,  a  somewhat  larger  scope  than 
theirs  ;  but  that  it  has  not  the  perfect  fineness 
of  fibre  of  theirs  I  am  sure.  I  am  not  criticising 
either  them  or  us ;  I  am  merely  stating  what 
seems  to  me  an  undeniable  fact.     No  doubt  there 


TWO   MODERN   CLASSICIST^  217 

are  many  musicians,  especially  of  the  older  gene- 
ration, now  alive  (albeit,  fewer  than  is  generally 
supposed)  who  have  enough  of  this  old  fineness 
and  purity  of  musical  sense  left  to  know  what  it 
is ;  but  those  of  them  in  whom  it  still  has  suffi- 
cient vitality  for  them  to  make  its  complete  satis- 
faction a  sine  qua  non  of  musical  enjoyment  must 
be  exceedingly  few  and  far  between.  Franz  and 
Dresel  were  the  last  prominent  figures  in  that 
goodly  company  of  musical  purists  ;  with  their 
death  the  old  fineness  of  musical  sense  became 
virtually  extinct.  And  if  I  call  them  purists,  I 
do  so  hesitatingly,  and  because  I  can  think  of  no 
better  term.  In  the  invidious  sense,  they  were 
really  not  purists  at  all ;  for  they  did  not  throw 
greater  stress  upon  purity  of  form  and  style  than 
upon  other  elements  in  the  art.  Nothing  was 
farther  from  their  nature  than  assthetic  dandy- 
ism ;  only  for  them  purity  of  form  and  style  was 
a  sine  qua  non. 

Of  the  two,  Franz  alone  was  a  creator.  Dresel, 
to  be  sure,  composed  to  a  certain  extent,  and  what 
he  wrote  was  often  surpassingly  fine ;  but  in  him 
the  spirit  of  self-criticism  was  stronger  than  the 
creative  impulse.  After  publishing  a  few  things, 
a  pianoforte  trio  and  some  smaller  pieces,  when 
still  a  young  man,  he  kept  countless  songs  in  his 
portfolio,  waiting  for  the  time  when  his  own  mu- 


218  'tifro  MODERN   CLASSICISTS 

sical  sense  should  have  sufficiently  matured  for 
him  to  trust  it  implicitly  ;  he  would  give  nothing 
to  the  public  that  he  might  be  sorry  for  or  ashamed 
of  later.  He  had  a  horror  of  letting  anything  cal- 
low go  on  record ;  he  was  not  content  with  satis- 
fying his  ideal  for  the  time  being,  but  must  wait 
until  he  could  be  sure  of  satisfying  his  perfected 
and  firmly  grounded  ideal.  And  the  maturing 
process  in  him  went  on  almost  indefinitely ;  it 
seemed  as  if  it  would  never  end ;  until  at  last, 
shortly  before  his  death,  he  did  publish  one  small 
book  of  songs — songs  written  years  before,  which 
had  survived  decades  of  cumulative  self-criticism, 
and  which  he  was  at  last  willing  to  father  as  some- 
thing worth  doing.  The  wonderful  beauty  of 
these  songs  might  make  one  lament  that  Dresel 
kept  them  back  so  long,  instead  of  giving  them 
to  the  world  at  once,  and  making  them  the  point 
of  departure  for  flights  into  other  and  loftier  re- 
gions of  composition,  did  one  not  recognize  the 
fact  that,  where  genius  is  truly  creative,  the  crea- 
tive instinct  is  ever  stronger  than  that  of  self-criti- 
cism, and  has  in  itself  a  certain  inborn  fearlessness 
that  prompts  it  to  compose,  and  give  to  the  world 
without  regard  for  consequences.  The  man  of 
genuine  creative  genius  can  not  help  flooding 
the  world  with  his  creations.  He  may  not,  and 
probably  does  not,  satisfy  his  own  highest  ideal ; 


TThe 
UNIVERSITY 

OF 
TWO   MODERN   CLASSICIsJE  219 

but  that  matters  little  to  him ;  he  has  done  his 
best  for  the  nonce>  and  can  not  wait  to  work  over 
it  longer ;  he  must  give  it  to  the  world  for  what  it 
is  worth,  and  try  to  do  better  next  time.  That 
Dresel  had  not  creative  genius  of  this  sort  seems 
evident  enough  ;  and  we  should  be  thankful  for 
the  beauty  of  the  few  songs  he  did  persuade  him- 
self to  publish  rather  than  regret  that  he  did  not 
publish  more.  Upon  the  whole,  there  is  no  such 
thing,  nor  was  there  ever  such  a  thing,  as  an  un- 
born master-work  ;  for  it  is,  and  ever  has  been, 
the  prime  characteristic  of  the  embryo  of  a  master- 
piece that  it  will  and  must  be  born ;  it  struggles 
uncontrollably  toward  birth,  and  nothing  under 
heaven,  save  fell  death  alone,  can  prevent  its  being 
born.  There  is  no  more  futile  lamenting  on  earth 
than  that  over  the  great  things  this  or  that  man 
did  not  do.  Devout  thankfulness  for  the  little 
and  insignificant  things  men  have  not  done  is  in- 
finitely wiser  ;  for  it  is  profoundly  true — though 
the  truth  thereof  is  too  often  overlooked  or  mis- 
appreciated — that  in  art,  as  in  other  matters,  the 
world  really  wants  nothing  but  masterpieces.  All 
else  it  is  well  able  to  do  without. 

Franz,  on  the  other  hand,  distinctly  was  a  crea- 
tive genius  ;  and,  like  all  true  geniuses,  as  distin- 
guished from  men  of  mere  talent,  he  was  a  man  of 
progress.    He  carried  the  German  Lied  to  its  high- 


220  TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS 

est  known  pitch  of  perfection.  Uniting  the  purely 
lyric  element  one  finds  in  such  splendour  in  Schu- 
bert with  the  wondrously  subtile  and  mobile  ex- 
pressiveness of  every  varying  shade  of  emotion  that 
characterized  Schumann,  fusing  these  two  elements 
so  that  their  union  was  absolutely — one  might  say, 
by  a  not  too  daring  figure,  "chemically" — com- 
plete, Franz  gave  the  finishing  master  touch  to 
the  plastic  form  of  the  Lied.  Franz's  songs  are 
as  truly  lyrics,  in  the  most  exact  sense  of  the  word, 
as  Schubert's ;  at  the  same  time,  they  are  to  the 
full  as  emotionally  expressive,  as  picturesquely  and 
poetically  suggestive,  as  vivid  pieces  of  tone-paint- 
ing, as  Schumann's.  And,  more  than  this,  he  has 
given  them  the  most  stoutly  organized,  pure,  and 
concise  form  known  in  song-writing.  Of  what 
Schubert  and  Schumann  did  before  him  Franz 
brought  the  natural  and  logical  completion ;  he 
crowned  the  edifice. 

In  thus  comparing  Franz  with  Schubert  and 
Schumann  as  a  song-writer,  I  have  intentionally 
left  his  own  personal  individuality  out  of  consi- 
deration ;  I  have  spoken  only  of  his  continuing  and 
completing  their  work  in  establishing  and  perfect- 
ing the  form  of  the  German  Lied.  But,  apart 
from  this,  his  own  genius  had  the  finest,  the  most 
unique  aroma;  it  was  as  individual  as  that  of 
any  man  who  ever  wrote.     Indeed,  after  looking 


TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS  221 

through  all  modern  art,  one  finds  Franz  to  stand 
utterly  alone  and  companionless  in  one  high  re- 
spect ;  to  find  a  parallel  to  the  spirit  that  breathes 
through  his  songs,  one  must  go  back  to  the  old 
Elizabethan  love  poetry  ;  nothing  else  in  our  own 
day  has  their  peculiar  aroma.  Franz's  songs  have 
j  ust  that  unforced  felicity  of  cadence  and  expres- 
sion, that  wholesome  out-of-door  freshness,  that 
refinement  without  priggishness,  warmth  without 
feverishness,  above  all  that  native  reverence  for 
purity  and  beauty,  that  we  find  in  the  English 
love  poems  of  Elizabeth's  day.  No  lover  can  be 
too  passionate  to  sing  them,  no  maid  too  pure  to 
hear  them. 

Their  "  vocality,"  to  coin  a  vile  word  to  fit  an 
abominably  abused  thing,  has  often  been  called  in 
question  ;  indeed  Franz's  songs  are  by  no  means 
always  written  according  to  the  rules  of  the  Italian 
oel  canto,  and  it  has  long  been  the  fashion  to  con- 
sider songs  that  do  not  obey  these  rules  as  pieces 
of  bad  vocal  writing.  But  this  objection  is  really 
foolish.  Because  even  the  finest  and  best  deve- 
loped vocal  technique  of  great  Italian  singers  is  not 
fully  equal  to  conquering  certain  technical  diffi- 
culties in  Franz's  songs,  there  is  no  more  reason 
to  call  them  essentially  unvocal  and  badly  writ- 
ten for  the  voice  than  there  would  be  for  saying 
that  Chopin's  nocturnes  and  preludes  are  pieces  of 


222  TWO   MODERN  CLASSICISTS 

bad  pianoforte  writing  because,  say,  Moscheles  or 
Hummel  could  not  have  played  them.  The  only 
difference  is,  that  the  peculiar  technique  needed 
to  play  Chopin  has  been  very  fully  developed  in 
pianists  to-day,  whereas  the  peculiar  vocal  tech- 
nique requisite  to  sing  Franz  has  been  only  very 
sparingly  developed  in  singers.  And  as  for  hel 
canto,  the  Franz  songs  differ  diametrically  from 
much  of  the  vocal  music  written  to-day  in  that 
they  are  but  seldom  declamatory  in  character,  but 
almost  always  purely  lyrical ;  they  have  a  del  can- 
to of  their  own — not  the  Italian,  but  another — 
and  imperatively  demand  that  it  shall  be  done  full 
justice.  The  vocal  technique  required  by  Franz's 
songs  still  remains  to  a  great  extent  a  problem  that 
singers  will  have  to  solve  for  themselves ;  some 
few  have  already  solved  it,  but  mastery  over  it  has 
by  no  means  become  general  as  yet.  I  myself,  moi 
qui  vous  parte,  have  heard  Franz's  songs  sung  as 
purely,  as  smoothly,  sustainedly,  and  with  as  per- 
fect emission  of  tone  as  I  ever  have  "  Casta  diva" 
or  "Una  furtiva  lagrima"  by  the  best  Italians. 
But  I  admit  that  it  has  not  been  often  ! 

It  has  been  regretted  that  Franz,  as  an  original 
creator,  confined  himself  so  exclusively  to  the  Lied, 
instead  of  spreading  a  wider  wing  in  flight  through 
larger  musical  domains.  His  technical  equipment 
was  probably  more  thorough  than  that  of  any  other 


TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS  223 

composer  of  his  day.  Perhaps  he  felt  the  short 
song  to  be  his  most  congenial  sphere,  and  had  no 
inner  spurrings  to  attempt  larger  things.  But 
one  may  suspect  there  was  something  else  that 
kept  him  from  trying  the  larger  forms  of  vocal 
composition  or  any  form  whatever  of  instrumental 
writing.  And  I  am  led  to  guess  that  this  some- 
thing else  may  have  acted  quite  as  effectually  upon 
Dresel  as  upon  him,  preventing  him  from  over- 
stepping the  limits  of  the  song,  and  discouraging 
Dresel  almost  wholly  from  doing  original  work  in 
any  field.  To  explain  what  this  something,  this 
mysterious  influence,  was,  let  me  quote  again  from 
Franz's  letters. 

In  a  letter  dated  November  23,  1890,  after  be- 
ginning thus  : — 

"  I  am  very  glad  that  you  agree  with  my  explanation  of 
Dresel's  attitude.  If  you  lay  strong  stress  upon  these  points 
of  view  in  your  intended  article,1  many  a  misunderstanding 
ahout  our  friend  will  be  cured  thereby. 

1 '  You  are  quite  right  in  calling  Liszt's  composing  in  the 
archaic  style  reflective,  for  every  imitation  drags  after  itself 
the  loss  of  naivete,  and  thus  leaves  the  domain  of  all  true 

artistic   creation.      The   Berlin  matadors,    ,   , 

,  etc. ,  labour  under  the  same  deficit. " 

He  goes  on,  in  reply  to  some  expostulations  of 
mine  with  the  exceedingly  black   view   he  had 

i  An  article  I  never  wrote,  by  the  way. 


224  TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS 

taken  of  the  future  of  the  art  of  music,  as  fol- 
lows : — 

"  So  you  really  believe  that  the  individualism  of  our  day, 
tearing  down  all  barriers  as  it  is,  is  but  a  process  of  fermenta- 
tion, the  precipitate  of  which  must  lead  to  a  clarification  pro- 
motive of  art !  If  you  mean  the  complete  negation  thereof, 
then  I  agree  with  you;  but  if  you  think  a  new  era  of  artis- 
tic productiveness  possible  as  the  result  of  this  clarification, 
then  our  views  go  far  asunder.  Every  development  has,  like 
everything  in  the  world,  its  beginning  and  its  end ;  the  de- 
velopment of  the  organism  of  art  like  the  rest.  Now,  you 
have  only  to  look  at  the  historical  progress  of  Music  to  descry 
in  it  an  uninterrupted  chain  of  perfectionments  and  retro- 
grade movements.  To  be  sure,  instances  of  disorganization 
occur,  but  their  place  is  immediately  taken  by  more  vital 
forms  in  other  domains.  Vocal  as  well  as  instrumental  music 
has  gone  through  this  process  ;  neither  of  them  could  ever 
rise  above  a  culminating  point  that  was  always  followed  by 
a  rapid  decadence.  Church  music  lived  to  have  this  fate 
during  and  after  the  period  of  Bach  and  Handel ;  then  the 
opera  before  and  after  '  Mozart,'  whose  name  I  especially 
emphasize  because  his  genius  possessed  the  highest  faculty 
of  dramatic  art :  •  to  create  figures  of  flesh  and  blood  ;  '  ■  far- 
ther on  the  epic  forms,  which  culminated  in  Beethoven  ; 
and  finally,  we  have  arrived  again  at  the  beginning  of  all 
art,  at  the  lyric,  which  seems  likewise  to  have  exhausted  its 
springs  to  the  very  bottom,  in  achieving  a  fusion  of  poetry 
and  music  which  can  hardly  be  carried  to  a  higher  pitch  of 
intimacy." 

1  This  was  in  allusion  to  an  article  of  mine  in  Scribner's  Magazine,  in 
which  I  had  spoken  of  Wagner's  having  "  created  figures  of  flesh  and 
blood." 


TWO   MODERN  CLASSICISTS  225 

In  another  letter,  dated  May  5,  1892,  he  says  : — 

"  As  I  know  you  from  your  letters  as  an  optimist  in- 
carnate, who  even  per  tot  discrimina  rerum  believes  in  a 
beautiful  future,  I  will  only  remark  that  our  art  has  been, 
in  its  noblest  results  and  for  divers  centuries,  its  own  object, 
and  that  it  may  at  last  be  high  time  to  take  in  hand  the  edu- 
cation of  human  kind,  its  higher  mission.  Trash  will,  of 
course,  be  excluded  thereby,  and  what  is  genuine  will  come 
into  its  rights." 

These  are  but  hints  ;  but  they  tend  to  show  that 
Franz  was  fully  persuaded  that  all  forms  of  com- 
position had  been  virtually  worked  out,  and  no- 
thing new  was  to  be  done  in  them  ;  the  field  of 
original  creation  in  music  was  closed,  or  fast  clo- 
sing, except  to  those  adventurous  modern  spirits 
to  whom  pure  individualism  in  expression  was  ac- 
ceptable as  a  worthy  aim  in  art.  At  any  rate,  as 
he  himself  could  not  accept  the  modern  idea,  the 
field  of  original  musical  creation  was  effectively 
closed  for  him,  save  in  that  one  still  perfectible 
form,  the  song.  Yet  it  is  easy  to  see  by  what  he  ac- 
tually did  that  this  beautiful,  but  narrowly  circum- 
scribed, form  of  composition  did  not  seem  to  him 
to  give  a  man  of  creative  genius  sufficient  scope  to 
make  it  worth  his  while  to  devote  his  whole  life- 
work  to  it.  Indeed,  if  we  look  through  the  history 
of  music,  we  can  find  no  single  instance  of  a  man 
of  really  high  creative  genius — even  among  those 
15 


226  TWO   MODERN  CLASSICISTS 

to  whom  we  owe  the  perfection  of  very  small  mu- 
sical forms — devoting  himself  exclusively  to  them. 
Take,  for  instance,  Schubert,  to  whom  we  owe  the 
establishment  of  the  Lied-form  ;  probably  his  most 
perfect  and  absolutely  original  work  was  done  in 
that  form  ;  but  he  was  not  content  to  apply  his  ge- 
nius to  it  alone,  he  also  worked  in  the  larger  fields 
of  the  symphony,  the  sonata,  concerted  chamber 
music,  church  music,  and  the  opera.  Take  Schu- 
mann, who  brought  the  short  fugitive  pianoforte- 
piece  to  such  perfection,  and  may  even  be  said  to 
have  created  the  genre — for  what  Haydn,  Mozart, 
and  Beethoven  had  done  before  him  in  this  line 
was  little  more  than  a  hint  that  something  great 
remained  to  be  done  in  it,  and  Mendelssohn's  Songs 
without  Words  were  rather  superficially  than  essen- 
tially a  new  development,  being  in  reality  little  or 
nothing  more  than  the  application  of  the  Lied- 
form.  to  pianoforte  writing;1 — even  Schumann 
could  not  confine  himself  to  the  short  morceau  de 
genre  for  pianoforte,  but  exploited  nearly  all  the 
largest  and  highest  domains  of  composition.  Cho- 
pin himself,  who,  barring  a  few  songs  and  a  piece 
or  two  of  concerted  chamber  music,  was  exclusively 
a  pianoforte  composer,  was  not  content  to  confine 

1  Saint-SaSns  well  said  that  "  where  Mendelssohn  has  given  ns  the 
loveliest  musical  water-colour  sketches,  Schumann  has  cut  veritable 


TWO  MODEEN   CLASSICISTS  227 

his  genius  within  the  limits  of  the  mazurka,  the 
waltz,  the  nocturne,  nor  the  short  free  prelude, 
but  must  needs  apply  himself  also  to  the  sonata, 
the  concerto,  the  scherzo,  and  the  longer  ballade  ; 
and  though  Chopin  brought  the  nocturne,  the  ma- 
zurka, and  the  short  prelude  to  a  pitch  of  perfec- 
tion never  equalled  before  nor  since,  and  his  most 
characteristic  work  was  done  in  these  small  forms, 
he  still  was  not  satisfied  with  limiting  himself  to 
them  alone.  And  it  would  have  been  strange  in- 
deed if  a  man  of  Franz's  genius  had  been  content 
to  immure  himself  in  the  restricted  domain  of 
song  writing.  Yet,  as  we  have  seen,  he  considered 
other  fields  of  original  creative  work  virtually 
closed  to  him.  What  he  did  do  is  well  known ; 
and  why  he  did  it  is  at  least  hinted  at  in  the  sen- 
tences, "  It  may  at  last  be  high  time  to  take  in  hand 
the  education  of  humankind,  its  (music's)  higher 
mission.  Trash  will,  of  course,  be  excluded  thereby, 
and  what  is  genuine  will  come  into  its  rights." 

There  was  one  high  field  left  for  the  musician  of 
genius,  even  of  creative  genius,  a  field  in  which 
the  great  Mozart  himself  had  done  pioneer  work, 
in  which  Mendelssohn  had  laboured,  but  which 
had  otherwise  been  left  to  men  of  mere  talent  and 
insufficient  ability.  This  was  the  filling-out  of 
the  incomplete  scores  of  Bach,  Handel,  and  other 
great  masters  of  their  day.     Here  was  work  in  the 


228  TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS 

very  highest  field  still  remaining  to  be  done  !  No- 
thing could  contribute  more  to  the  higher  musical 
"  education  of  humankind "  than  the  populariza- 
tion of  Bach  and  Handel ;  and  by  worthily  filling 
out  the  vacant  gaps  in  their  monumental  scores, 
what  was  " genuine "  would  be  enabled  to  "come 
into  its  rights."  I  remember  Dresel  once  saying 
that  he  considered  the  completion  of  Bach's  and 
HandeFs  scores  the  highest  task  now  left  for  musi- 
cians to  accomplish.  One  need  have  little  doubt 
that  this  feeling,  coupled  with,  and  in  part  spring- 
ing from,  the  conviction  that  all  fields  for  purely 
original  musical  creation  were  virtually  worked 
out  and  closed,  was  what  impelled  both  Franz 
and  Dresel  to  devote  the  better  part  of  their  lives 
to  the  work  they  did  on  Bach  and  Handel. 

I  have  but  small  inclination  to  examine  or  cri- 
ticise this  conviction  here.  I  personally  can  not 
agree  with  it ;  I  even  find  it  difficult  to  imagine 
it ;  as  Franz  said,  I  still  believe  in  a  beautiful  fu- 
ture, that  the  present  barrier-spurning  spirit  of 
ultra-individualism,  with  all  the  chaotic  and  mon- 
strous phenomena  to  which  it  has  given  birth,  is 
really  but  a  transitory  "  process  of  fermentation, 
the  precipitate  of  which  must  lead  to  a  clarification 
promotive  of  art."  And  I  have  perfect  faith  that 
the  clarification  will  come  in  due  time.  Even  the 
history  of  music — although  it  proved  the  contrary 


TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS  229 

to  Franz — only  strengthens  my  faith,  if  it  in  any 
way  needed  strengthening.  An  almost  precisely 
similar  "instance  of  disorganization  (Verwilde- 
rung)  "  is  to  be  found  in  the  Florentine  Music  Re- 
form of  the  seventeenth  century ;  there,  too,  was 
a  temporary  reign  of  barrier-breaking  individua- 
lism, an  utter  subversion  of  all  that  was  "  typical " 
and  "universal."  Ask  the  classicists,  the  ac- 
knowledged great  masters,  of  that  day  what  they 
thought  of  Caccini,  Peri,  and  Monteverde,  with 
their  stile  rappresentativo  and  their  establishment 
of  the  music-drama,  and  whether  they  could  see 
anything  in  the  movement,  or  in  the  music  that 
resulted  from  it,  but  sheer  chaos  regained  ?  There 
was  a  "process  of  fermentation"  with  a  vengeance! 
But  the  precipitate  came,  and  with  it  the  clarifica- 
tion ;  music  could  not  remain  forever  in  the  amor- 
phous state  into  which  the  Florentines  had  thrown 
it,  for  that  which  has  in  itself  the  potency  and 
power  of  organism  tends  irrepressibly  to  develop 
itself  organically.  Nay,  one  may  even  say  with 
absolute  truth  that  the  particular  ferment  that 
raised  all  this  Florentine  row-di-dow  contained  the 
fructifying  vital  principle  that  made  it  possible  for 
Bach  and  Handel  to  be  born  from  Palestrina,  the 
Gabrielis,  and  Orlando  Lasso.  History  has  but  to 
repeat  itself,  and  the  "  clarification  "  we  now  look 
for  may  come. 


230  TWO   MODERN  CLASSICISTS 

But,  though  one  need  not  agree  with  the  vieft 
of  the  present  and  future  condition  of  the  art  of 
music  taken  by  Franz  and  Dresel,  a  conviction  so 
thorough,  honest,  and  unflinchingly  lived  up  to  as 
theirs  can  not  but  command  the  most  reverent  re- 
spect. No  matter  whether  their  feeling  and  argu- 
ments convinced  you  or  not,  they  were  every  inch 
true  men,  men  of  genuine  genius,  powerful  brains, 
and  wide  culture ;  in  short,  they  were  men  who 
abundantly  deserved  to  be  listened  to.  No  men 
that  ever  lived  were  less  fit  subjects  for  mere  pooh- 
poohing.  And,  when  we  consider  what  the  results 
of  this  artistic  conviction  of  theirs  have  been,  we 
must  find  that  the  world  has  little  cause  to  be 
otherwise  than  profoundly  thankful  that  they  were 
what  they  were  and  thought  as  they  did.  What 
they  did  for  the  incomplete  scores  of  Bach  and 
Handel  is  unquestionably  to  be  counted  among 
the  things  the  world  really  wants,  and  hence  can 
not  do  without,  as  true  master  work. 

The  violent  controversy  between  the  small  Franz 
party  and  the  far  larger  ' '  historical "  party  about 
the  Bearleitungsfrage,  the  question  of  filling  out 
the  gaps  left  by  the  old  composers  in  their  scores, 
is  one  which  I  need  not  go  into  at  great  length ; 
many  of  the  arguments  on  both  sides  are  so  inse- 
parably interwoven  with  musical  technicalities  as 
to  make  their  rehearsal  out  of  place  here. 


TWO  MODERN  CLASSICISTS  231 

But  it  will  be  none  the  less  interesting  to  hear 
Franz  himself  talk  about  it  a  little ;  not  a  few  pas- 
sages in  his  letters  to  me  give  a  fine  picture  of  the 
man  himself,  of  the  sturdy  fighter  for  his  own 
principles,  unshaken  in  his  faith,  if  somewhat  em- 
bittered and  turned  to  causticity  by  hard  usage  ; 
these  passages  also  throw  light  upon  the  only  ele- 
ment in  the  controversy  which  I  shall  permit  my- 
self to  take  up  in  this  essay.  In  a  letter  dated 
August  6,  1889,  he  writes,  in  reply  to  some  re- 
marks of  mine  on  the  general  attitude  of  musical 
criticism  in  this  country  : 

"With  us,  too,  does  criticism  hold  fast  with  convulsive 
grip  by  mere  externals  in  judging  of  the  question  of  addi- 
tional accompaniments,  and  can  not  get  beyond  the  idea 
of  instrumental  retouching.  Of  the  spiritual  vitality,  the 
afflatus  divinus,  that  everywhere  pervades  Bach's  and  Han- 
del's compositions,  and  to  which  the  complementary  addi- 
tions must  in  some  measure  correspond,  the  gentlemen  have 
no  inkling,  and  have  therefore  nothing  to  say  on  the  main 
point.  But  this  in  no  wise  prevents  their  incessantly  trot- 
ting out  their  bomees  opinions  and  looking  down  with  envy 
upon  endeavours  that  are  beyond  their  miserable  powers  of 
comprehension.  You  are  right,  too,  in  saying  that  the 
boundless  vanity  of  professional  singers  bears  a  substantial 
part  of  the  blame  for  the  current  misapprehensions  about 
Bach's  and  Handel's  airs.  These  gentry  never  care  for  the 
thing  itself,  but  only  for  their  own  personal  success.  As 
vocal  music  since  Mozart  has  its  centre  of  gravity  in  the  can- 
tilena,  people  think  they  may  apply  this  to  compositions  of 


232  TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS 

earlier  periods  also,  which  are  almost  without  exception 
written  polyphonically  —  whereby  the  remaining  web  of 
voices  comes  off  badly  enough.  But  we  will  not  let  our- 
selves be  led  astray  by  this  crazy  company  and  its  adherents, 
but  will  now,  as  heretofore,  let  the  honour  be  to  Truth  ;  it 
will  carry  off  the  palm  in  the  end,  in  spite  of  all." 

Again,  in  a  letter  dated  October  8  of  the  same 
year,  he  writes : 

'*  That  the  Communications  about  Bach's  Magnificat l  do 
not  dissatisfy  you  rejoices  me  greatly.  The  most  valuable 
part  of  them  is  probably  the  side-remarks  on  the  ideal  con- 
tents (Gehalt)  of  the  master's  works.  If  you  could  occasion- 
ally communicate  some  of  these  to  your  fellow-countrymen, 
you  would  compel  my  thanks.  I  read  with  astonishment 
in  your  letter  that  the  magazines  published  in  America  re- 
fuse to  accept  the  least  word  about  Sebastian  Bach .  So  there 
are  queer  people  everywhere — not  only  here  in  this  country ! 
Bach  has  a  future,  like  Shakspere  ;  he  but  honours  himself 
who  acts  on  this  point  of  view. 

1 '  You  are  very  right  in  saying  that  between  the  artistic 
perception  and  the  historico-philological  recognition  of  a  fact 
there  yawns  a  chasm  that  is  hardly  to  be  bridged  over. 
Those  who  hold  to  the  latter  can  not  even  conceive  how  the 
historical  must  always  be  sublimated  in  the  artistic.  In  his 
pamphlet,  Robert  Franz  in  his  Additional  Accompaniments 
to  Old  Vocal  Works,  J.  Schaeffer,  after  quoting  a  few  sen- 
tences from  my  Open  Letter,2  goes  on  to  say  :  '  How  sur- 

i  Mittheilungen  uber  J.  S.  Bach's  Magnificat,  von  Robebt  Franz  ; 
Halle,  1863. 

2  Offener  Brief  an  Eduard  Hantlick  Uber  Bearbeitungen  alterer  Ton- 
werke,  namentlich  BacK'scher  und  HdndeV scher  Vocalmusik,  von  Robert 
Fbanz  ;  Leipzig,  18T1, 


TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS  233 

prisingly  exact  is  the  agreement  of  these  sentences  with 
Mattheson's  and  Heinichen's  directions  !  How  deeply  is  the 
historian  here  thrown  into  the  shade  by  the  practical  (aus- 
ubenderi)  artist !  The  former,  alheit  in  possession  of  all  his- 
torically established  facts,  remains  still  blind  to  them  ;  the 
latter,  perhaps  without  any  sort  of  suspicion  of  what  stands 
written  in  the  old  books,  achieves,  through  practical  experi- 
ments and  the  divining  faculty  of  genius,  results  which  alone 
prove  to  be  vouched  for  by  history  ! '  Why,  it  is  axiomatic 
that  every  working-out  of  an  old  composition  must  penetrate 
the  secret  of  its  style,  and  so  must  be  historically  right. 
Bach's  and  Handel's  sketches  do  not  endure  our  modern  ex- 
pression, but  must  be  completed  in  the  forms  of  the  day 
when  they  were  written.  But  to  this  end  one  need  not 
plough  through  the  musty  old  books ;  one  has  but  to  question 
his  own  artistic  conscience.  He  who  does  not  comprehend 
that  is  a  blockhead  ! 

"  The  German  historical  party  think  to  have  an  easy  job 
with  me  by  denouncing  me  to  the  public  as  a  mere  song- 
scribbler  (Bankelsdnger),  who  dares  to  lay  profane  hands  on 
Bach  and  Handel.  The  fools  naturally  do  not  know  that 
my  musical  developments  rest  on  the  basis  of  polyphonic 
forms  of  expression,  for  they  are  much  too  high  and  mighty 
to  look  into  such  small  wares.  Luckily,  the  gentlemen's 
stupid  experiments  facilitate  our  pointing  out  their  sins 
against  those  masters.  That  they  were  in  no  condition  to 
refute  us  has  contributed  much  to  swell  their  wrath.  How- 
ever, many  enemies,  much  honour !  " 

Again,  under  date  of  July  14,  1890,  lie  writes  : 

11 1  willingly  believe  you  that  the  true  essence  of  Bach's 
music,  mystical  depth  combined  with  mathematical  strict- 


234  TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS 

ness,  was  not  comprehended  by in ,  and  was  shorn 

over  the  same  comb  with  common  wares.  But  is  it  any 
better  in  this  respect  here  in  this  country  ?  How  low  musi- 
cal taste  has  sunk  with  us  may  be  proved  to  you  by  this  :  that 
the  young  director  of  a  famous  conservatory  dared  to  pro- 
claim that  Mendelssohn's  Songs  without  Words  were  '  sheer 
thoosy-moosy  feeling,'  and  a  noted  young  German  author  had 
the  impudence  to  call  Schubert's  songs  '  hand-organ  senti- 
mentality.' These  are  the  consequences  of  modern  realism ! 
What  our  '  strong-minded '  folk  can  not  grasp  with  their  fists 
is  cast  without  further  ado  into  the  rubbish-bin  !  Whither 
in  the  world  are  we  steering  ? 

1 '  Half  a  year  ago  the  musical  works  of  Frederick  the 
Great  were  published  by  the  firm  of  Breitkopf  &  Hartel,  by 
order  of  Emperor  William  II. ,  and  under  the  chief  supervi- 
sion of  the  academic  music-historian,  Philipp  Spitta.  All  the 
sonatas  are  written  for  flute  with  figured  continuo,  and  there- 
fore necessitate  a  working-out  of  the  accompaniment.  Old 
Fritz's  music  is  in  the  main  capital,  and  contains  Sicilianos 
such  as  Handel  could  not  have  written  more  soulfully ;  in 
face  of  such  genuine  beauty  the  accompaniment  should 
naturally  sbow  no  falling-off.  But  now  there  has  appeared 
in  No.  17  of  the  Hamburger  Signale  an  article  which  simply 
annihilates  Spitta's  edition  and  proves  the  bungling  charac- 
ter of  the  working-out  by  examples  in  notes— it  swarms  with 
5ths  and  octaves.  The  affair  makes  all  the  more  painful  an 
impression  that  our  young  Emperor  has  presented  an  exem- 
plaire  de  luxe  of  his  ancestor's  compositions  to  Jules  Simon  in 
Paris,  where  messieurs  les  Frangais  can  convince  themselves 
what  sort  of  spirits  are  cocks  of  the  walk  now  in  musical 
Germany.  The  High-School  clique,  with  the  renowned 
Joachim  at  their  head,  are  naturally  in  sheer  despair,  and 
have  reason  enough  therefor." 


TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS  235 

Under  date  of  August  16,  1890,  he  goes  on  : 

"  The  great  Spitta  has  tried  to  justify  himself  in  a  reply 
that  runs  over  with  futilities.  According  to  his  assertion, 
the  accompaniment  is  the  most  indifferent  matter  in  the 
world,  which  any  one  is  at  liberty  to  treat  as  he  happens  to 
please  ;  he  may  make  changes  at  will  without  thereby  in- 
juring the  substance  of  the  composition  in  any  way — in  short, 
the  scribble  is  an  oratio  pro  domo  pronounced  by  a  tho- 
roughly impotent  man  upon  himself.  If  you  will  give  a 
glance  at  my  additional  accompaniments,  you  will  hardly 
look  upon  this  domain  as  of  secondary  importance.  To 
write  in  the  style  of  the  old  masters,  which  is  here  absolutely 
necessary  for  the  sake  of  unity,  is  not  one  of  the  tasks  you 
can  carelessly  shake  out  of  your  sleeve.  Neither  does  Spitta 
make  any  bones  of  the  fact  that  in  those  days  men  of  Bach's 
and  Handel's  stamp  sat  accompanying  at  the  cembalo  or 
organ  ;  they  did  not  write  out  the  accompaniment,  and  must 
therefore  be  content  with  what  we  botch  together  in  all 
haste,  this  way  to-day  and  to-morrow  that.  Of  course  with 
such  a  dogma  Music  can  be  raised  out  of  her  hinges— God 
help  our  children  and  grandchildren !  " 

The  letter  dated  May  5, 1892,  from  which  I  have 
already  quoted  (page  225),  begins  : 

"Your  letter  contains  little  that  is  cheering  about  the  con- 
dition of  music  to-day.  Communications  of  the  sort  in  no 
wise  surprise  me,  however ;  for,  since  the  principles  have 
been  suspended  that  ruled  artistic  expression  from  Palestri- 
na  to  Beethoven,  phenomena  like  those  you  describe  must 
necessarily  make  their  appearance.  Up  to  Beethoven  and 
his  epigones  people  held  fast  by  the  idea  that  melody,  har- 


236  TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS 

mony,  and  rhythm  were  the  fundamental  elements  of  mu- 
sic ;  the  neo-Germanic  school  has  radically  destroyed  these 
and  set  up  in  their  stead  the  absolute  freedom  of  the  personal 
element.  Men  like  Berlioz,  Liszt,  and  Wagner  could  to  a 
certain  extent  compensate  for  this  by  the  weight  of  their 
personality ;  but  the  army  of  those  who  have  followed  in 
their  footsteps,  not  being  able  to  throw  such  a  weight  into 
the  scale,  have  necessarily,  in  face  of  this  intolerance  of  all 
barriers,  ushered  in  universal  chaos." 

This  was  elicited  by  some  accounts  I  had  given 
him  of  new  works  of  the  latest  French  school  that 
I  had  heard  in  Paris,  where  I  had  been  spending 
the  winter  and  spring  of  1890-91.  Later  in  the 
same  letter  he  goes  on  to  say  as  follows  : 

"  The  experiment  of  having  the  dear  public  sing,  too,  in 
the  chorals  of  the  Matthew-Passion  1  must  have  turned  out 
badly  enough,  for,  in  his  harmonization  of  them,  Bach 
thought  only  of  an  ideal  congregation.  What  can  have  come, 
for  example,  of  the  choral,  *  Was  mein  Oott  will,  gescheh'  aU- 
zeitf  especially  at  the  place  ■  und  zuchtiget  mit  Maassen '  f 
How  much  people  hang  on  externalities  in  the  rendering  of 
Bach's  and  Handel's  works  has  been  proved  by  the  fight  the 
London  philisterium  billed  against  me  about  my  Messiah 

score.     Even  E P did  not  dive  to  the  heart  of  the 

question  of  additional  accompaniments,  the  restoration  of  the 

1  This  experiment  turned  out  not  to  be  quite  so  thorough-going  as  I 
had  supposed  before  the  performance,  when  I  wrote  to  Franz  about  it. 
In  some  of  the  performances  of  the  Passion-Music  given  by  the  Handel 
&  Haydn  Society  in  Boston,  the  audience  was  invited  to  join  in  singing 
the  melody  of  some  of  the  chorals— not  of  all,  as  I  had  supposed.  Of 
their  singing  the  harmony  there  had  never  been  any  question  whatever. 


TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS  237 

musical  style  of  the  complementary  parts,  but  had  only  to  do 
with  things  that  lie  wholly  outside  that  domain.  And  yet  it 
is  of  the  highest  importance  in  this  matter  whether  one 
knows  how  to  write  in  the  style  and  spirit  of  the  old  mas- 
ters, or  not.  People  ought  to  thank  Heaven  that  the  solution 
of  this  difficult  problem  has  been  striven  after  by  me  in  de- 
cently fitting  forms !  I  never  should  have  undertaken  such 
work,  had  it  been  a  question  of  nothing  more  than  instru- 
mentation, which  the  first  town-piper  that  came  along  could 
have  carried  out  effectively. 

"  I  have  just  received  your  article  in  the  Contemporary 
Review, l  but  must  once  more  lament  my  being  too  little  a 
master  of  the  English  language  to  edify  myself  therewith  as 
it  deserves.  I  shall  seud  it  to  Dr.  Prieger,3  who  will  com- 
municate to  me  the  staple  of  its  contents.  I  am  much 
pleased  that  you  took  in  the  two  quotations  from  my  Commu- 
nications, for  they  contain  the  quintessence  of  what  is  need- 
ful for  the  understanding  of  Bach's  art.  But  when  Herr  Hans- 
lick  talks  about  polyphonic  style  and  what  hangs  together 
therewith,  then  I  am  sick  outright !  He  who  hears  in  Bach's 
world-famous  motet,  '  Singet  dem  fferrn  tin  neues  Lied,' 
nothing  but  scales  running  up  and  down  should  not  let  his 
tongue  coquet  with  the  old  master's  name  and  expression. 
On  his  visit  to  Leipzig,  Mozart  had  the  voice-parts— there 
was  no  score — laid  before  him,  and  cried  out  enchanted, 
4  Here  at  least  one  can  learn  something  from  a  man  ! '  How 
sharply  this  modesty  contrasts  with  Hanslick's  impudent 
condemnation !  " 

i  On  Johann  Sebastian  Bach. 

»  Erich  Prieger,  who  published  a  few  years  ago  a  very  able  pamphlet 
abundantly  proving  the  spuriousness  of  the  St.  Luke-Passion,  attributed 
to  Bach  by  Dr.  Philipp  Spitta  and  others  before  him,  and  recently  pub- 
lished by  Breitkopf  &  Hartel  in  Leipzig. 


238  TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS 

I  said  I  would  take  up  only  one  point  in  the 
controversy  between  Franz  and  the  German  his- 
torical party  about  the  additional-accompaniments 
question :  this  is  the  utter  misapprehension  of 
Franz's  point  of  view  by  his  opponents.  This 
misapprehension  has  been  so  complete,  so  obsti- 
nate, that  one  is  at  moments  tempted  to  think  there 
could  be  nothing  but  partisan  ill-will  behind  it. 
Yet  I  have  found  it  in  so  many  people  who  were 
not  especially  interested  in  the  controversy,  who 
could  not  possibly  have  any  partisan  prejudice  in 
the  matter,  and  were  rather  inclined  to  sympathize 
with  Franz  than  otherwise, — not  so  much  for  what 
he  really  did  as  for  what  they  thought  he  had  done, 
— that  it  seems  to  me  there  is  ground  for  believing 
the  anti-Franzites  to  be  not  entirely  dishonest. 
Indeed,  it  was  very  noteworthy  that  the  author  of 
one  of  the  exceedingly  few  obituary  notices  on 
Franz  that  appeared  in  German  newspapers  shortly 
after  his  death,  and  of  the  most  glowingly  enthu- 
siastic one,  too,  evidently  shared  this  misapprehen- 
sion with  his  most  embittered  opponents.  What 
this  misapprehension  is  may  be  seen  plainly  enough 
from  the  passage  in  the  letters  just  quoted,  where 
Franz  says,  "With  us,  too,  does  criticism  hold 
fast  with  convulsive  grip  by  mere  externals  in 
judging  of  the  question  of  additional  accompani- 
ments, and  can  not  get  beyond  the  idea  of  instru- 


TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS  239 

mental  retouching."  Even  the  author  of  the  ad- 
miring obituary  notice  I  have  just  mentioned 
speaks  of  his  U  amplifying  the  monumental  scores 
of  Bach  and  Handel  to  satisfy  the  greater  demands 
for  sonority  made  by  the  modern  ear."  Such  a 
statement,  coming  from  an  "  admirer,"  was  fit  to 
make  the  good  Franz  turn  in  his  grave  ! 

Here  is  not  the  place  to  go  into  the  merits  of 
the  case ;  I  will  merely  emphasize  the  fact  that, 
whereas  Franz — and  with  him  Dresel — threw  the 
whole  weight  of  his  arguments  upon  the  real  gist 
of  the  question,  upon  the  musical  style  in  which 
the  additional  accompaniments  should  be  writ- 
ten, the  historical  party  almost  without  exception 
dodged  this  issue  and  laid  stress  upon  what  instru- 
ment, or  instruments,  the  additional  accompani- 
ments should  be  written  for.  Franz  knew  as  well 
as  anybody  that  Bach  and  Handel  used  to  fill  out 
the  vacant  places  they  had  left  in  their  scores  with 
improvised  accompaniments  on  the  organ  or  clavi- 
chord ;  remember  the  passage  in  his  letters  where 
he  says  that  "  in  those  days  men  of  Bach's  and 
Handel's  stamp  sat  accompanying  at  the  cembalo 
or  organ  ; "  and,  if  he  preferred  to  write  his  addi- 
tional accompaniments  for  orchestral  instruments, 
instead  of  the  organ  or  pianoforte  (the  modern 
representative  of  the  clavichord,  or  cembalo),  it 
was  for  reasons  amply  satisfactory  to  himself.    But 


240  TWO  MODERN  CLASSICISTS 

note  this :  he  announced  again  and  again  that,  if 
conductors  of  choral  societies  did  not  agree  with 
him  in  preferring  orchestral  instruments,  but  pre- 
ferred the  organ  or  pianoforte,  he  was  perfectly 
willing  to  have  them  transcribe  his  additional  ac- 
companiments for  one  or  the  other  of  these  instru- 
ments, so  long  as  they  preserved  the  musical  out- 
lines of  what  he  had  written  ;  that  the  question  of 
instruments  was  in  his  mind  one  of  utterly  secon- 
dary importance.  In  one  case l  he  even  did  this 
work  of  transcription  himself,  writing  and  publish- 
ing, beside  his  orchestral  amplification  of  the  score, 
a  separate  organ-accompaniment,  to  be  used  in  con- 
nection with  Bach's  original  parts  and  without  his 
own  orchestral  additions.  But,  pay  what  defe- 
rence he  might  to  other  people's  preference  for  the 
organ  or  clavichord,  announce  as  emphatically  as  he 
pleased  that  he  was  willing  to  have  his  orchestral 
parts  played  on  either  of  these  instruments,  and 
that  the  musical  style  in  which  his  additional  parts 
were  written  was  all  he  deemed  of  essential  im- 
portance, he  but  spoke  to  deaf  ears  ;  his  opponents 
refused  to  see  anything  in  his  work  but  additional 
instrumentation,  orchestral  retouching,  of  the  sort 
Sir  Michael  Costa  permitted  himself  when  he  added 
trombones,  bass-tuba,  and  big  drum  and  cymbals 

1  In  his  edition  of  the  cantata,   "  Sie  warden  aus  Saba  Alle  kom- 
men." 


TWO  MODEEN  CLASSICISTS  241 

to  the  already  complete  score  of  Mozart's  Don  Gio- 
vanni,    lis  ne  sortaient  pas  de  la  ! 

The  reason  for  this  persistent  misunderstanding 
of  Franz's  principle — apart  from  partisan  obsti- 
nacy— was  doubtless  that  hinted  at  by  Franz  when 
he  said,  "  Between  the  artistic  perception  and  the 
historico-philological  recognition  of  a  fact  there 
yawns  a  chasm  that  is  hardly  to  be  bridged  over." 
Franz's  arguments  were  all  based  on  his  own  high- 
ly cultivated  artistic  perceptions,  on  ideas  ;  those 
of  his  opponents,  on  mere  historical  data.  And 
the  latter  could  not  see  that  their  historical  data, 
the  accuracy  of  which  Franz  never  for  a  moment 
called  in  question,  had  really  nothing  to  do  with 
what  he  was  talking  about.  Not  being  men  of 
musical  genius  and  the  keen,  profound  insight 
into  the  genius  of  others  that  comes  therewith, 
they  could  in  no  wise  comprehend  either  the  fine- 
ness or  the  trustworthiness  of  Franz's  perceptions ; 
they  were  unable  to  see  that,  with  all  their  histori- 
cal and  biographical  researches,  they  had  sounded 
the  mighty  heads  of  Bach  and  Handel  only  wig- 
deep  at  best,  and  that  Franz,  with  his  artist's  in- 
tuition and  sympathy,  had  penetrated  not  only 
their  mighty  brains,  but  down  to  their  very  heart 
of  heart.  So  all  Franz  might  say  about  his  prin- 
ciples was  but  Greek  to  them ;  they  could  no  more 
understand  him  than  a  Tierra  del  Fuegian  can 
16 


242  TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS 

understand  the  subjunctive  mood.  Again,  it  is 
not  difficult  to  see  why  the  arguments  of  the  his- 
torical party  should  have  had  far  more  influence 
upon  outsiders  in  general  than  those  advanced  by 
Franz  ;  the  "  historical "  arguments  were  all  more 
or  less  on  the  principle  that  "figures  can  not  lie" 
— they  were  based  on  facts,  and  the  public  mind 
is  peculiarly  open  to  facts.  But  Franz's  argu- 
ments, being  based  on  perceptions  and  ideas,  were 
of  a  far  more  subtile  and  illusive  sort ;  they  were 
by  no  means  so  palpable  to  popular  apprehension. 
Naturally  most  music-lovers  did  not  take  the 
trouble  to  examine  into  the  question  very  closely ; 
if  they  cared  to  look  into  the  matter  at  all,  they 
did  so  cursorily,  as  one  would  skim  over  a  news- 
paper. It  was  perfectly  natural  for  people  in  this 
state  of  mind,  when  they  found  that  there  were 
two  opposing  parties,  and  that  one  of  them  based 
its  arguments  on  uncontroverted  facts,  to  believe 
that  this  party  must  be  right. 

That  Franz's  uncompromising  classicism  should 
have  left  him  more  and  more  solitary  and  out  of 
touch  with  other  musicians  of  his  time  was  una- 
voidable ;  this  introduced  into  his  life  an  element 
of  sadness  that  was  still  further  darkened  by  his 
physical  infirmity,  gradually  approaching  total 
deafness.  To  find  that  the  spirit  of  the  time  is 
not  with  him,  to  be  more  and  more  forgotten  and 


TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS  243 

ignored  as  old  age  advances,  is  sad  for  any  man  of 
genius;  but  to  find  all  hands  raised  against  him 
in  a  cause  not  his  own,  but  which  he  with  unself- 
ish reverence  has  most  at  heart, — that  infuses  a 
drop  of  bitterness  into  the  cup  such  as  few  men 
could  bear  the  taste  of.  Here  are  two  letters  by 
Franz,  the  first  of  which  I  will  quote  entire,  for  it 
seems  to  me  the  most  completely  tragic  I  have  ever 
read.  These  letters  were  in  reply  to  my  asking 
him,  at  the  instance  of  the  president  of  the  Handel 
&  Haydn  Society  of  Boston,  if  he  would  not  write 
additional  accompaniments  to  Bach's  great  B  mi- 
nor Mass  for  that  society.  He  had  already  written 
his  score  to  Handel's  Messiah  especially  for  the 
Handel  &  Haydn,  and  the  president  empowered 
me  to  promise  him  far  greater  pecuniary  recom- 
pense for  a  similar  score  to  the  Mass  than  the  so- 
ciety had  been  able  to  offer  him  for  the  Messiah, 
Franz's  first  reply  was  as  follows  : 

"My  dear  Mr.  Apthorp, — 

"  Honourable  to  me  as  the  task  you  promise  is,  I  unfortu- 
nately can  not  accept  it.  To  jot  down  note-heads  with  pain- 
fully cramped  fingers  is  in  itself  one  of  the  things  at  the  very 
thought  of  which  my  hair  stands  on  end  ;  when  to  this  is 
added  a  wholly  destroyed  head  {dn  wllig  destruirter  Kopf), 
that  makes  precise  thinking  impossible,  then  would  it  be 
sheer  presumption  to  undertake  a  labour  that  demands  the 
whole  man  !  For  the  amplifications  to  the  B  minor  Mass,  it 
is  not  merely  a  question  of  restoring  a  congruous  style,  but, 


244  TWO  MODEEN  CLASSICISTS 

what  means  far  more,  of  a  fruitful  and  devoted  absorption 
in  the  poetic  essence  of  this  composition  ;  a  working-out  of 
the  figured  bass  according  to  the  mere  rules  of  the  craft 
fails  utterly  to  hit  the  mark.  My  reconstructive  labours,  in 
so  far  as  Seb.  Bach  is  concerned,  have  struck  out  into  paths 
that  try  to  do  justice  to  both  demands  ;  as  a  dead-tired  man 
I  must  now  leave  it  to  my  colleagues  whether  they  will  con- 
descend to  follow  me.  That  no  working  by  pattern,  such  as 
the  modern  historical  party  ask  for,  will  suffice  here  is  abun- 
dantly proved  by  the  bunglings  of  the  '  artists '  who  let 
themselves  be  guided  by  those  pedantic  fools ;  and  to  op- 
pose more  fitting  forms  for  the  B  Minor  Mass  to  the  above- 
mentioned  bunglings  was  something  for  which  I  had  neither 
incitement  nor  inclination,  at  a  time  when  my  additional 
accompaniments  were  bespattered  with  mud.  Now,  at  last, 
people's  eyes  seem  to  be  opened  to  the  disconsolate  quality  of 
those  machine-made  articles  (jener  Machwerke)  ;  for  in  the 
course  of  the  last  several  years  I  have  been  asked  at  least  a 
dozen  times  about  additional  accompaniments  to  the  B  minor 
Mass.  Of  course  I  could  give  no  other  information  than  that 
contained  in  the  above  lines.  To  be  sure,  thirty  years  ago — 
my  ears  had  not  yet  refused  me  their  service  at  that  time — 
the  work  was  performed  under  my  direction  with  an  accom- 
paniment to  the  first  three  numbers,  the  Credo,  the  Sanctus, 
and  the  Osanna,  such  as  the  extremest  necessity  demanded  ; 
but  the  forms  were  not  ready  for  the  press,  and  consisted 
only  of  fragments  of  parts,— all  else  was  left  for  further  ela- 
boration. Even  to-day  I  can  remember  the  mystic  sounds 
in  the  Incarnatus  that  dropped  down  over  the  voice-parts 
like  a  veil  from  the  clouds!     Tempi  passatif 

u  Be  so  kind  as  to  communicate  these  lines  to  the  president 
of  the  Handel  &  Haydn  Society,  to  whom  I  permit  myself 
to  give  the  advice — in  the  interests  of  the  B  minor  Mass, 


TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS  245 

you  understand— rather  to  give  up  the  performance  than  to 
put  it  through  with  a  '  bad '  organ  part 1  that  can  only  in- 
jure the  wondrous  work. 

• '  What  on  earth  has  become  of  your  article  on  Dresel  ? 
"Your  Rob.  Franz." 

Halle,  May  27,  '92. 

On  my  communicating  this  letter  to  the  presi- 
dent of  the  Handel  &  Haydn  Society,  he  begged 
me  to  write  once  more,  and  ask  if  the  fragmentary 
parts  mentioned  therein  could  not  be  found  and 
forwarded  to  Boston,  as  certainly  half  a  loaf  was 
better  than  no  bread.  Franz  answered  the  second 
time  thus : 

"My  dear  Mr.  Apthorp,— 

"  I  am  very  sorry  to  be  able  to  give  you  no  information  to 
correspond  to  the  wishes  of  the  president  of  the  Handel  & 
Haydn  Society.  Our  performance  of  the  B  minor  Mass  came 
at  a  time  when  I  was  in  initiis  of  my  labours  on  additional 
accompaniments,  and  I  could  not  turn  out  anything  artisti- 
cally complete.  If  I  remember  aright,  little  pieces  of  mu- 
sic paper  with  the  most  necessary  additions  were  inserted  in 
the  respective  orchestral  parts ;  what  has  become  of  them, 
Heaven  knows !  If  the  gentlemen  are  absolutely  bent  on 
repeating  the  wonderful  work,  then  I  agree  with  your  opi- 
nion to  have  it  performed  rather  without  additions  than  with 
defective  ones.  In  the  former  case,  one  can  at  least  imagine 
what  may  still  be  wanting,  whereas  a  working-out  according 

1  Franz  here  seems  to  have  overlooked  the  fact  that  I  had  not  written 
him  about  a  "bad  organ-part,"  but  about  a  "bad  organ"  (the  doleful 
instrument  now  in  the  Boston  Music  Hall),  upon  which  no  organ-part  of 
any  description  whatever  could  be  effective. 


246  TWO  MODERN  CLASSICISTS 

to  the  ideas  of  the  historians  will  only  result  in  bunglings 
that  will  obliterate  the  outlines  of  the  original  parts  them- 
selves. A  little  while  ago  I  saw  some  samples  of  various  or- 
gan-parts to  Bach's  church  compositions,  of  which  one  was 
ever  worse  than  another ;  the  most  wretched  of  all,  how- 
ever, came  from  the  high  and  mighty  society  in  Berlin  !  • 

[Here  follows  a  passage  on  another  subject,  too  personal 
for  present  publication.     The  letter  ends  :  ] 

"  Of  the  splendour  of  your  *  Indian  summer '  I  have  often 
read  with  rapture  in  the  writings  of  Charles  Sealsfield.  If 
one  could  only  see  it,  too  ! 

"  With  the  fairest  greetings, 

"Your  Rob.  Franz." 

Halle,  October  7,  1892.2 

That  Dresel  sympathized  completely  with  all 
Franz's  feelings  on  the  additional-accompaniments 

1  This  was  in  response  to  an  account  I  had  given  him  of  an  experience 
of  mine  in  Paris.  The  Society  des  Concerts  at  the  Conservatoire  had 
given  some  wonderfully  fine  performances  of  the  B  minor  Mass,  almost 
the  only  hlot  on  which  was  the  utterly  unsatisfactory  organ-part.  I  sub- 
sequently ventilated  my  feelings  about  this  organ-part  to  M.  Jules  Gar- 
cin,  the  conductor  of  the  society,  to  which  he  replied :  "  I  don't  blame 
you  in  the  least ;  for  we  were  all  dissatisfied.  But  this  is  how  it  was  : 
You  know  we  are  extremely  careful  to  do  everything  as  correctly  as  pos- 
sible at  the  Conservatoire,  so  we  were  particularly  anxious  to  do  the  B 
minor  Mass  according  to  the  best  traditions.  We  therefore  sent  to  Ger- 
many for  an  organ-part,  there  being  none  written  out  in  the  score ;  but 
when  it  came,  we  found  it  so  bad  that  we  had  to  hand  it  over  to  M.  Guil- 
mant  to  revise  it  and  make  it  even  harmonically  correct !  "  Remember- 
ing Franz's  disgust  at  a  copy  of  the  Breitkopf  &  Hartel  edition  of  Frede- 
rick the  Great's  flute  sonatas  being  sent  to  Paris,  and  thus  exposed  to 
the  scrutiny  of  French  musicians,  I  wrote  him  this  story. 

8  This,  the  last  letter  I  ever  received  from  Franz,  was  written  little 
more  than  a  fortnight  before  his  death,  October  24, 1892, 


TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS  247 

question  need  not  be  said  again.  He  was  one  of  the 
most  ardent  champions  of  Franz's  scores  to  Bach's 
and  Handel's  works,  made  himself  a  masterly 
pianoforte  score  from  his  score  to  the  Messiah,1 
and  showed  in  his  own  pianoforte  accompaniments 
to  many  of  the  airs  from  Handel's  oratorios  and 
Italian  operas  how  entire  this  agreement  was.2 
He,  too,  had  that  wondrous  insight  of  genius  into 
the  essence  of  another's  genius,  and  depended  on 
it  unreservedly.  I  remember  his  saying,  one  day, 
"  It  does  not  seem  to  occur  to  the  idiots  who  ob- 
ject to  Handel's  scores  being  filled  out  orchestrally 
that  it  is  an  argument  of  some  weight  that  a  man 
like  Mozart  thought  it  a  proper  thing  to  do  ! 
Why,  Mozart's  opinion  of  what  is  right  to  do  for 
Handel  is  worth  that  of  a  hundred  thousand  pro- 
fessors of  musical  history  ! " 

In  like  manner,  he  said  of  the  various  editions 
of  Bach's   Well-tempered   Clavichord,   with  their 

1  The  only  thoroughly  excellent  pianoforte  score  of  the  Messiah  in  ex- 
istence. But  this  is  too  faint  praise,  considering  the  quality  of  the  others 
published. 

a  If  any  of  my  readers  would  have  a  realizing  sense,  by  actual  experi- 
ment, of  the  world-wide  difference  between  the  sort  of  work  Franz  and 
Dresel  demanded  and  that  asked  for  by  the  "  historical "  party,  I  would 
beg  them  to  compare  Dresel's  pianoforte  accompaniment  to  the  favourite 
Sleep  air  in  Handel's  Semele  with  that  which  runs  along  the  bottom  of  the 
pages  in  the  edition  of  the  German  Handel  Society  published  by  Breit- 
kopf  &  Hartel.  If  they  do  not  then  see  how  far  the  inanity  of  the  one 
falls  short  of  the  wondrous  grace  of  the  other,  then  are  they  past  praying 
for! 


248  TWO  MODERN   CLASSICISTS 

mutually  irreconcilable  readings  of  certain  pas- 
sages, that,  of  all  the  editions  ever  published,  the 
one  edited  by  Karl  Czerny  almost  invariably  con- 
tained the  best  version.  He  was  at  the  time  en- 
gaged in  preparing  a  new  issue  of  the  work  to- 
gether with  Franz,  and  had  all  the  different 
versions  of  disputed  passages  at  his  fingers'  ends. 
In  making  their  selections  from  these  different 
readings,  both  he  and  Franz  allowed  themselves 
to  be  guided  by  their  artistic  judgment  alone,  re- 
gardless of  all  external  evidence  touching  the 
authenticity  or  spuriousness  of  any  of  them ;  in 
short,  they  chose  only  those  that  were  best  and 
most  like  Bach.  And,  in  speaking  of  Czerny's 
edition,  Dresel  suggested  that  its  excellence  might 
not  be  owing  to  any  special  musical  perspicacity 
or  carefulness  in  research  on  Czerny's  part,  but 
that,  as  Czerny  was  a  pupil  of  Beethoven,  his 
manuscript  might  very  likely  have  passed  under 
Beethoven's  eye,  and  "Beethoven's  opinion  on 
such  a  matter  would  necessarily  be  of  inestimable 
value."  In  the  same  way,  he  thoroughly  agreed 
with  Franz  in  denying  the  authenticity  of  the  St. 
Luke-Passion. 

— "  I  know  very  well,"  said  he,  "  that  the  score 
is  undeniably  in  Bach's  autograph, — it  is  his  hand- 
writing ;  all  the  experts  agree  on  that  point.  But 
when  Bach  students  like  Mendelssohn  and  Franz 


TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS  249 

unhesitatingly  assert,  after  a  careful  examination 
of  the  work,  that  it  is  morally  impossible  that 
Bach  ever  composed  it,  that  it  swarms  with  whop- 
pers (Schnitzer),  such  as  we  find  in  no  other  work 
by  Bach  written  at  any  period  in  his  life,  you  may 
be  sure  their  opinion  is  the  right  one.  The  fact 
that  it  is  in  Bach's  own  hand  goes  for  nothing; 
he  may  have  copied  it,  as  he  copied  off  many  an- 
other thing.  To  pit  such  evidence  as  that  and  the 
mere  knowledge  that  Bach  did  write  a  St.  Luke- 
Passion  of  some  sort  against  the  testimony  of  men 
like  Mendelssohn  and  Franz  is  sheer  insanity. " 

I  do  not  know  whether  Franz  was  ever  accused 
of  inconsistency,  as  Dresel  certainly  was  often 
enough ;  that  both  of  them  should  have  been  ac- 
cused of  "  narrowness  "  was  not  unnatural, — not 
unnatural,  but  intrinsically  false.  But  men  of 
very  determined  principles  have  been  called  nar- 
row before.  It  may  be  that  Dresel  showed  the 
scope  of  his  musical  appreciation  more  fully  to 
those  who  knew  him  well  than  to  people  in  ge- 
neral ;  he  was  by  no  means  what  one  would  call 
a  guarded  man  in  his  conversation,  and  would  of- 
ten flare  out  with  the  most  violent  opinions  on 
very  slight  provocation ;  but  he  was  exceedingly 
careful  about  the  influence  he  might  exert  upon 
others,  and  would  think  twice  before  expressing 
likings  or  dislikings — especially  the  former — where 


250  TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS 

there  was  a  chance  of  his  being  misunderstood. 
For  several  years  after  his  first  coming  to  Boston 
he  was  set  on  a  sort  of  artistic  tripod  in  certain 
circles,  and  made  the  object  of  no  little  hero-wor- 
ship ;  his  word  was  law.  He  was  never  in  the 
least  thrown  off  his  balance  by  adulation,  but  he 
did  take  what  was  really  serious  in  his  position 
very  seriously.  He  felt  that  he  could  exert  a  sa- 
lutary musical  influence  upon  his  surroundings, 
and  took  great  pains  to  do  or  say  nothing  that 
might  interfere  with  the  particular  influence  he 
wished  to  exert.  He  thus  often  gave  a  somewhat 
false  impression  as  to  what  his  feelings  regarding 
certain  composers  really  were;  considering  it  need- 
less to  dwell  on  the  better  side  of  men  whose  po- 
pularity was  firmly  established,  and  whose  influence 
upon  the  public  in  general  he  thought  none  of  the 
best.  I  remember  that,  at  the  time  when  he  used 
to  play  the  pianoforte  a  good  deal,  both  in  public 
and  at  friends'  houses,  he  was  fond  of  playing  one 
little  piece,  the  name  of  the  composer  of  which  he 
kept  a  profound  secret.  No  one  could  ever  find 
out  from  him  who  wrote  that  piece.  Years  after- 
wards, when  I  reminded  him,  one  day,  of  his  whim 
for  making  a  secret  of  the  composer,  and  hinted 
that  he  might  have  written  the  little  trifle  himself, 
he  laughingly  answered  : 

— "  Oh,  no,  it  was  no  false  modesty  ;  I  did  n't 


TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS  251 

write  it.  The  thing  is  really  charming;  it  was 
one  of  those  happy  accidents  that  sometimes  hap- 
pen to  a  thoroughly  fourth-rate  man.  The  man 
who  wrote  it  was  not  in  the  least  worthy  of  it. 
There  was  no  need  of  letting  people  know  his  name 
and  unsettling  their  ideas  about  him,  which  were 
in  the  main  quite  correct." 

It  was  a  counterpart  of  Kossini's   "  E  troppo 

buono  per  questo  c "  when  he  stole  some  other 

composer's  aria  and  put  it  into  one  of  his  own 
operas.  During  the  earlier  part  of  Dresel's  life 
in  Boston,  Italian  opera,  with  Grisi,  Mario,  and 
others  of  the  now  vanished  gods,  was  all  the  rage, 
and  he  deemed  its  influence  upon  the  musical 
public  rather  debilitating.  He  accordingly  did 
not  give  its  devotees  any  encouragement,  which 
led  most  people  to  imagine  that  he  thoroughly 
abominated  the  whole  business,  and  would  have 
been  glad  to  exterminate  it,  root  and  branch.  But 
that  was  far  enough  from  being  his  real  feeling. 
In  later  years,  he  admitted  to  me  that  he  had  often 
played  Bellini's  "  Casta  diva/'  arranged  by  him- 
self as  a  pianoforte  nocturne. 

— "  Not  in  public,"  said  he,  "nor  to  any  one  in 
private, — that  sort  of  thing  needed  no  '  booming ' 
from  me  at  the  time, — but  to  myself,  as  a  study  in 
phrasing.  The  melody  is  divinely  beautiful.  You 
can  see  that  Bellini  did  not  have  to  rack  his  brains 


252  TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS 

to  find  his  second  phrase,  but  that  it  grew  right 
out  of  the  first  by  the  Heaven-sent  impulse.  Then 
that  change  to  D  minor  is  exquisite,  a  real  stroke 
of  genius ! n 

Another  time  he  was  glancing  through  the  In- 
gemisco  in  Verdi's  Requiem  with  me.  His  brow 
grew  darker  and  darker,  and  at  last,  pointing  with 
his  finger  to  a  certain  passage,  he  cried  out  in  ut- 
ter disgust : 

— ( '  There  !  look  at  that !  That  is  what  we  used 
to  call,  in  Germany,  regularly  dirty  (schmutzig) 
writing  ;  it  blackens  the  page  without  saying  any- 
thing. The  man  wrote  those  middle-parts,  not 
because  he  wanted  to,  but  because  he  could  not 
think  of  any  other  way  of  getting  out  of  the  scrape. 
But  look  here  ! "  turning  back  to  the  beginning  of 
the  Requiem.  "  Where  in  heaven  did  Verdi  find 
that  C-sharp  minor  chord  on  ' et  lux3?  That  is 
one  of  the  most  impressive  effects  I  know  of  any- 
where !  Aha !  the  old  boy  knew  what  he  was 
about  that  time.    He  meant  that,  every  note  of  it." 

One  Sunday  afternoon  I  went  up  to  him  in  the 
picture  gallery  of  the  St.  Botolph  Club,  just  af- 
ter the  first  movement  of  Grieg's  string  quartet 
had  been  played,  and  asked  him,  jokingly,  what 
he  thought  of  that  for  a  piece  of  modern  writ- 
ing. He  made  no  answer,  but  looked  unutterable 
things. 


TWO  MODERN   CLASSICISTS  253 

"  Never  mind/'  said  I,  still  in  fun,  "  wait  till 
you  hear  the  Romanza;  that  is  something  diffe- 
rent." 

I  took  a  seat  beside  him,  and  the  quartet  of 
players  began  the  Romanza.  Much  to  my  surprise, 
he  whispered,  after  the  first  three  or  four  phrases: — 

— "  IFm  !  yes  ;  that  shows  talent,  that  shows 
real  invention.  I  do  not  like  it ;  I  very  much  dis- 
like it ;  bat  it  does  show  genuine  talent ;  the  man 
has  something  to  say." 

— "It  is  graceful,  at  all  events,"  I  answered. 

— "  Graceful  ?  No,  I  do  not  call  that  graceful ; 
it  is  too  strained.  It  has  a  certain  seductiveness, 
if  you  will ;  but  God  help  the  man  who  needs  wax 
in  his  ears  for  such  a  siren  ! " 

The  whole  Wagnerian  movement  was  naturally 
profoundly  antipathetic  to  him,  although  he  per- 
fectly appreciated  that  there  was  that  in  it,  and 
more  especially  in  Wagner  himself,  which  made 
pooh-poohing  out  of  place.  But  Wagner's  musical 
individuality  was  as  distasteful  to  him  as  his  style. 
Yet  one  morning,  shortly  after  his  return  from  a 
rather  long  stay  in  Europe,  I  met  him  at  the  Tre- 
mont  Street  corner  of  the  Common,  and,  after  the 
first  greetings  were  over,  said  to  him  : — 

— "  So  I  hear  you  've  been  to  Bayreuth  and  heard 
Parsifal  t" 

— "  Yes,  I  have  heard  Parsifal.  I  did  not  want 


254  TWO   MODERN  CLASSICISTS 

to  go,  but  they  insisted  so  that  I  should  be  a  fool 
not  to  that  I  gave  in  and  went."  Then,  going  on 
very  seriously,  almost  reverently,  "  It  was  one  of 
the  most  tremendous  experiences  of  my  life  ! 
There  is  an  unity  in  the  whole  thing ;  it  is  enor- 
mously impressive  ;  and  it  is  all  noble  (edel)  and  on 
a  very  high  intellectual  and  poetic  plane.  I  am 
not  speaking  of  the  music,  but  of  the  whole  im- 
pression. As  for  the  music,  you  do  not  think  about 
it  at  the  time ;  you  hear  it,  as  Wagner  says,  '  con- 
sciously unconsciously/ — ah,  Wagner  was  talking 
no  nonsense  when  he  invented  that  phrase,  (  be- 
wusstvoll  unbewusst/ — and  it  only  adds  to  the 
general  impressiveness.  To  be  sure,  after  you  get 
home  and  to  bed,  you  become  conscious  of  having 
heard  a  great  many  very  disagreeable  things,  which 
you  try  hard  to  forget.  In  the  whole  three  acts  I 
found  only  one  really  beautiful  musical  idea,  that 
first  phrase  of  the  flower-girls, — (  Komm  !  komm  ! 
holder  Knabe  ! '  That  is  one  of  those  phrases  that 
take  hold  of  you  to  the  marrow  of  your  bones, — 
one  of  those  phrases,  such  as  only  Wagner  could 
write.  But  it  comes  to  nothing,  it  is  not  worked 
out ;  what  follows  it  is  absolutely  weak." 

His  experience  with  Parsifal  did  not  breed  any 
such  enthusiasm  in  Dresel  as  inspired  Franz,  in 
1852,  to  dedicate  a  book  of  songs  (s  to  the  Com- 
poser of  Lohengrin  ;  "  in  reality  it  did  nothing  to 


TWO   MODEEN   CLASSICISTS  255 

change  his  estimate  of  Wagner  as  a  composer. 
After  1852,  the  year  in  which  Lohengrin  was  first 
brought  out  in  Weimar  by  Liszt,  it  did  not  take 
Franz  long  to  get  over  his  Wagner  enthusiasm ; 
and  to  their  dying  day  both  he  and  Dresel  were 
strong  anti-Wagnerites.  It  is  somewhat  curious, 
however,  that,  of  all  anti-Wagnerians  who  have 
been  at  performances  of  the  Bayreuth  master's 
music-dramas,  Franz  and  Dresel  should  have  been 
the  ones  who  listened  to  them  most  in  the  way  that 
Wagner  himself  wished  them  to  be  listened  to, — 
giving  themselves  up  unreservedly  to  the  first  total 
impression  without  listening  critically  to  the  mu- 
sic as  such. 

Dresel's  "purism"  was  as  thoroughgoing  as 
possible,  the  more  so  that  it  was  well  past  the 
self-conscious  stage, — if  indeed  it  had  ever  been 
through  it, — and  was  functionally  part  and  parcel 
of  his  whole  artistic  nature.  His  demands  on 
nobility  of  expression  in  music  were  to  the  full  as 
exacting  as  those  he  made  on  purity  of  form.  I 
have  already  quoted  his  "  God  help  the  man  who 
needs  wax  in  his  ears  for  such  a  siren  ! "  in  rela- 
tion to  the  Eomanza  in  Grieg's  quartet ;  in  a  simi- 
lar spirit,  I  once  heard  him  say  of  Grieg's  favour- 
ite song,  "  Icli  Hebe  dich  !  "  that  the  expression 
was  too  overdone  and  ignoble,  and  that  "  a  man 
who  loved  so  would  crack  ribs  V 


256  TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS 

There  was  not  the  faintest  tinge  of  the  pedant 
in  him  ;  there  was  no  merely  "  academic  n  side  to 
this  artistic  bent.  His  aesthetic  principles  were 
so  purely  the  outcome  of  his  own  nature  that  they 
lay  in  his  consciousness  in  the  condition  of  spon- 
taneous instincts, —  instincts  which  it  might  be 
worth  his  while  logically  to  account  for,  it  is  true, 
but  still  retaining  all  their  vitality  and  immediate- 
ness.  For  the  letter  of  the  law  he  cared  less  than 
nothing;  the  spirit  was  all  in  all  to  him.  One 
day  he  showed  me  a  volume  of  Chopin's  nocturnes 
on  the  margin  of  a  page  of  which  was  pasted  a 
little  slip  of  music-paper  with  a  measure  of  mu- 
sic in  writing. 

— ' '  Look  at  the  leading  of  those  middle-parts," 
said  he.  "I  once  heard  Saint-Saens  play  that 
measure  so,  and  got  him  to  write  it  out  for  me ; 
since  then  I  have  often  played  it  so,  too.  It  was  a 
happy  inspiration  of  Saint-Saens's  :  it  is  Chopin 
through  and  through,  Chopin  all  over  ;  Chopin 
himself  would  have  accepted  it,  if  he  had  heard 
it!" 

I  suggested  that  that  sort  of  thing  might  be  a 
dangerous  precedent ;  to  which  he  replied  : 

— "  I  am  not  going  to  make  a  precedent  of  it, 
nor  let  anybody  else  make  one,  either.  I  have 
showed  it  only  to  you,  and  you  do  not  play  the 
pianoforte  to  people.     Then,  if  any  one  should 


TWO  MODERN  CLASSICISTS  257 

happen  to  catch  me  at  it,  and  complain  of  my 
taking  liberties  with  Chopin,  I  could  answer  back 
that  at  least  I  have  never  been  guilty  of  playing 
that  misprint  D-sharp  acciaccatura  in  the  second 
measure  of  the  Romanza  in  the  E  minor  concerto, 
that  is  in  all  but  the  very  latest  editions,  and  has 
been  played  by  pianist  after  pianist  all  over  the 
world.  I  never  made  Chopin  write  such  abomi- 
nable harmony  as  that  D-sharp  in  the  right  hand 
makes  against  the  D-sharp  in  the  bass.  The  thing 
ought  plainly  enough  to  be  a  B-natural,  and  no- 
body but  a  duffer  could  have  taken  it  for  anything 
else." 

For  a  man  of  his  naturally  strong  feelings  and 
uncompromising  views,  he  was  remarkably  free 
from  prejudice.  For  instance,  although  he  would 
never  admit  that  Berlioz  was  a  great,  nor  even  a 
good,  harmonist,  in  spite  of  all  his  subtlety,  he  one 
day  pointed  out  to  me  a  passage  in  Weber's  Invi- 
tation a  la  Valse  in  which  he  showed  that  Weber 
had  written  a  very  bad  bass,  and  then  showed  me 
how  Berlioz  "  had  perceived,  and  very  properly 
corrected,  the  error"  in  his  orchestral  transcrip- 
tion of  the  piece.  Most  men  with  DreseFs  dislike 
for  Berlioz  and  admiration  for  Weber  would  have 
cried  out  against  the  former's  "  vandalism."  With 
all  his  cool  regard  for  the  fashionable  Italian  opera 
composers, — I  have  already  mentioned  his  practi- 
17 


258  TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS 

sing  "Casta  diva"  as  a  pianoforte  nocturne, — he 
would  go  into  raptures  over  certain  things  of  Ros- 
sini's ;  he  had  a  special  admiration  for  the  over- 
ture to  Ouillaume  Tell  and  the  first  act  of  the 
Barbiere.  I  remember  his  saying  one  day,  about 
the  opening  ' '  Piano,  pianissimo  I  "  scene,  that  it 
showed  genius  of  the  first  water  ;  "  Mozart  himself 
could  not  have  written  it  better.  Then  the  or- 
chestration, that  bassoon  doubling  the  first  violins 
in  the  octave,  with  its  suggestion  of  darkness,  is 
simply  masterly. " 

During  the  earlier  years  of  his  life  in  Boston, 
it  was  only  his  intimate  friends  who  associated  him 
especially  with  Bach  and  Handel ;  to  the  musical 
public  he  stood  much  more  as  the  champion  of 
Chopin  and  Schumann,  and  of  Robert  Franz's 
songs.  In  those  days,  when  he  was  still  promi- 
nently before  the  public  as  a  pianist,  he  used  to 
play  Chopin  a  great  deal ;  he  was  also  extremely 
fond  of  playing  Liszt's  transcriptions  of  Franz  and 
Schubert  songs,  and  that  of  Weber's  Schlummer- 
lied.  In  fact,  he  was  generally  accepted  as  a  cham- 
pion of  the  then  ' '  modern-romantic  "  school,  but 
still  with  strong  leanings  toward  the  classics.  He 
was  rather  chary  about  playing  Bach  or  Handel  in 
public,  since  the  cultivation  of  a  popular  taste  and 
appreciation  for  these  masters  was  the  object  near- 
est his  heart,  and  he  saw  how  important  it  was  not 


TWO  MODERN   CLASSICISTS  259 

to  excite  any  antipathy  to  them  in  the  beginning  ; 
he  knew  he  had  a  hard  task  before  him,  and  was 
very  circumspect  about  what  experiments  he  made. 
If  the  charge  of  "  narrowness"  so  often  brought 
against  Dresel  was  really  unfounded,  this  was  not 
quite  the  case  with  the  charge  of  "  inconsistency." 
In  truth,  he  often  seemed  the  most  inconsistent 
man  imaginable.  But,  in  the  last  analysis,  this  in- 
consistency of  his  was  more  apparent  than  real. 
He  would  say  one  thing  one  day,  and  another  dia- 
metrically opposite  the  next,  and  generally  with  a 
violence  and  frankness  that  left  nothing  to  be  de- 
sired. In  his  playing,  and  later  in  his  conducting, 
he  would  take  the  same  thing  at  a  very  different 
tempo  on  different  occasions.  He  was  no  believer 
in  the  modern  school  of  " emotional  performance" 
and  "  rhythmic  freedom ; n  he  said  repeatedly 
that  a  certain  stability  and  unity  of  tempo  was  an 
essential  part  of  that  unity  of  form  which  all  true 
music  should  have.  But,  as  Franz  said  of  him, 
he  was  an  extremely  "  subjective  "  man,  of  very 
strong  feelings  and  high-strung  nerves,  and  could 
not  help  following  the  impulse  of  the  moment. 
Although  a  man  of  wide  intellectual  scope,  tho- 
roughly logical  in  his  cast  of  mind,  and  able  to 
look  at  things  from  various  points  of  view,  as  a 
rule  he  took  only  one  point  of  view  at  a  time,  and 
for  the  moment  that  was  the  only  one  that  existed 


260  TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS 

for  him.  It  was  this,  more  than  anything  else, 
that  gave  him  the  appearance  of  inconsistency; 
and  it  took  a  long  and  intimate  acquaintance  with 
him  to  appreciate  that  this  inconsistency  with 
himself  was  only  superficial,  after  all.  For  there 
was  really  a  fine  harmony  underlying  all  he  said 
and  did ;  his  seemingly  irreconcilable  and  contra- 
dictory utterances  were  but  momentary  expressions 
of  different  sides  of  one  and  the  same  firmly  con- 
vinced and  unswervingly  true  individuality.  He 
was  a  far  more  spherically  developed  nature  than 
all  but  a  few  of  his  friends  gave  him  credit  for  be- 
ing, and  saw  clearly  enough  that  the  whole  truth 
was  never  on  any  one  side  ;  but  in  his  conversation 
he  almost  always  gave  voice  to  the  truth  that  lay 
uppermost  in  his  mind  at  the  time.  Sometimes  he 
would  make  his  friends  stare.  I  shall  never  forget 
the  impression  made  by  one  of  his  outbreaks  at  a 
meeting  of  the  program  committee  of  the  Harvard 
Musical  Association  at  the  time  of  the  old  sym- 
phony concerts.  There  had  been  a  good  deal  of 
discussion  about  putting  I  now  forget  what  com- 
position on  the  program,  when  Dresel  suddenly 
sprang  up  and  said  : 

— "  Mr.  President  and  Gentlemen  :  Let  me  re- 
mind you  of  the  fact  that,  in  making  up  these 
programs,  we  should  not  consult  only  our  own 
personal  taste  in  the  matter.     If  I  consulted  only 


TWO  MODERN  CLASSICISTS  261 

my  own  pleasure,  I  should  have  no  Beethoven,  no 
Bach,  no  Mozart,  no  Schubert,  no  Schumann,  no 
Handel,  no  Haydn,  no  Mendelssohn,  nor  Weber, 
nor  Oherubini ;  but  only  Wagner  and  Berlioz  and 
Kaff  and  Liszt  and  Goldmark  and  Kubinstein  and 
all  the  rest  of  them.  But  that  would  be  a  ques- 
tionable education  for  our  audiences,  and  we  real- 
ly must  consider  that." 

Almost  everyone  present  thought  he  was  joking, 
and  his  speech  was  greeted  with  a  hearty  laugh  ; 
but  I  heard  him  mutter,  half  to  himself  and  half 
to  me,  as  he  turned  away  : 

"  That  rubbishy  idea  of  taking  pleasure  in  hear- 
ing the  same  old  things  played  year  after  year  in 
the  same  old  way  !  I  can  imagine  no  more  infer- 
nal bore — except  listening  to  the  whole  of  a  Bach 
suite  at  a  sitting." 

He  was  really  in  earnest,  or  a  good  deal  more 
than  half  in  earnest ;  only  those  who  heard  him 
failed  to  detect  what  the  real  main-spring  of  his 
speech  was.  It  is  perfectly  true  that  he  did  take 
pleasure  in  hearing  new  music,  in  knowing  what 
was  going  on  in  the  musical  world,  and  getting 
new  emotions.  He  was  fond  of  hearing  things 
that  "  had  a  go  to  them ; "  and  I  remember  his 
frantically  applauding  a  performance  of  Liszt's 
second  rhapsody  (the  "young  ladies'  seminary" 
rhapsody)  by  Thomas's  orchestra, — muttering  the 


262  TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS 

while,  u  Do  you  think  I  had  not  rather  hear  that 
than  the  fifth  symphony  all  washed  out  with  sen- 
timentality ?"  To  be  sure,  the  performance  of 
the  fifth  symphony  that  evening  had  been  rather 
lackadaisical. 

But  his  enjoyment  of  the  new  music  was  afleur 
de  peau,  a  sort  of  superficial  tickling ;  he  had  no 
sympathy  with  it  nor  its  ideals.  He  strongly  de- 
plored anything  like  artistic  omnivorousness  in 
any  one.  He  used  to  speak  of  Liszt  as  "  absolutely 
a  musical  ostrich,"  who  could  digest  anything. 
He  spoke  of  Ferdinand  Hiller's  " having  not  en- 
tirely secret  yearnings  for  the  Italian  siren,"  for 
which  "  Mendelssohn  scolded  him  roundly,  often 
enough."  "  Where  things  are  irreconcilable,  you 
must  take  one  side  or  the  other,"  he  would  say, 
"  or  else  you  lose  all  artistic  spinal  column,  and 
become  a  mollusk."  In  speaking  of  the  modern 
schools,  he  once  said  :  "I  find  no  lack  of  talent  in 
these  new  lights,  sometimes  I  even  find  hints  at 
genius  ;  but  what  seems  to  be  utterly  dead  and 
gone  is  all  real  mastery.  Of  course  I  object  to  the 
things  they  do,  but  I  should  not  object  half  so 
strongly,  and  sometimes  I  should  not  object  at  all, 
if  they  only  did  them  better.  Look  here  !  "  dart- 
ing across  the  room,  and  taking  up  a  volume  of 
Bach's  organ  preludes  (Choralvorspiele).  "Look 
at  this  closing  cadence,  with  its  audacious  transi- 


TWO  MODERN  CLASSICISTS  263 

tion  through  a  distant  key.  Mr.  Gounod  and  Mr. 
Bizet  could  not  do  finer  than  that  !  But  old  Bach 
did  it  well ;  there  is  some  hang-together  and  rea- 
son in  it ;  and  it  is  divinely  beautiful.  The  old 
boy  knew  it,  too,  perfectly  well ;  for  see,  he  has 
written  '  adagiosissimo '  over  it !  * 

After  all,  it  was  in  talking  about  the  great  clas- 
sic masters  that  Dresel  showed  himself  thoroughly 
at  his  best ;  then  his  enthusiasm  knew  no  bounds, 
and  he  would  ransack  three  languages  for  glowing 
terms  and  striking  similes.  Yet,  in  the  hottest 
blaze  of  his  enthusiasm  over  these  congenial 
themes,  he  would  never  for  a  moment  lose  his  ba- 
lance ;  even  in  argument  and  discussion  he  kept  hia 
head  and  heels  to  perfection.  One  day,  when  he 
was  pointing  out  to  me  some  particular  beauty  in 
the  seventh  symphony,  I  mentioned  having  just 
heard  a  certain  lecturer  call  Beethoven ' '  the  great- 
est composer  of  all  time." 

— ' ' Now,  what  foolish  talk  that  is  ! "  cried  Dre- 
sel, "  the  greatest  composer  !  He  was  the  greatest 
in  the  symphony,  in  the  sonata,  and  in  the  string 
quartet ;  but  in  Music's  house  there  are  many 
mansions.  Bach  and  Handel  did  far  greater  work 
than  he  in  oratorio  and  church  music ;  where  is 
he  on  the  organ,  compared  with  Bach  ?  And  with 
all  his  great  pianoforte  sonatas,  he  never  wrote  the 
Well-tempered  Clavichord,  which  is  a  work  of  a 


264  TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS 

certain  importance  in  its  way.  Then  Mozart  was  a 
greater  opera- writer  than  he,  and  surely  Schubert 
pretty  well  knocked  him  out  in  song- writing.  The 
greatest  composer  !  Will  you  please  tell  me  who 
is  the  greatest  composer  ?  " 

Upon  the  whole,  it  was  in  speaking  of  Bach, 
Handel,  Haydn,  Mozart,  Beethoven,  and  Schubert 
that  the  sureness  of  his  mental  and  emotional  ba- 
lance showed  itself  most  unmistakably,  and  that 
his  expression  of  opinion  was  least  swayed  by  the 
mood  of  the  moment.  Not  that  his  expression  was 
less  downright  and  violent,  but  that  one  found  less 
apparent  inconsistency  in  it.  He  ill  brooked  con- 
tradiction, especially  on  the  subject  nearest  his 
heart,  and  anything  touching  the  honour  of  his 
favourite  composers  would  call  forth  the  frankest 
and  bluntest  remarks  from  him.  A  certain  musi- 
cian once  showed  him  arrangements  for  two  piano- 
fortes of  Bach's  concertos  for  three  clavichords  and 
strings  that  he  had  just  added  to  his  library,  ask- 
ing him  if  he  knew  these  arrangements.  "  Yes," 
answered  Dresel ;  ?*  they  are  the  most  outrageous 
pieces  of  butchery  ever  committed." 

His  criticisms  on  musical  doings  in  other  fields, 
particularly  on  musical  performances,  were  seldom 
so  downright ;  but  his  caustic  sarcasm  would  be 
none  the  less  biting.  Coming  out  one  afternoon 
from  a  pianoforte  recital  given  by  a  certain  young 


TWO   MODEEN  CLASSICISTS  265 

woman,  I  asked  him  what  he  thought  of  the 
pianist's  future  prospects. 

— (t  Ah,  the  beautiful  young  creature  !  *  said  he. 
' '  Her  prospects,  who  knows  ?  She  plays  with  so 
much  feeling  .  .  .  such  very  wrong  notes 
.  .  .  and  holds  them  so  lovingly  !  .  .  . 
Whew!" 

Another  time  I  was  looking  over  the  score  of  a 
new  symphony  with  him  at  a  rehearsal.  At  a  cer- 
tain strenuous  passage  he  began  under  his  breath  : 

— "  Miaou  !  miaou  !  we  shall  have  to  get  an- 
other mise  en  scene  for  the  concert ;  we  ought  to 
have  a  roof,  with  a  ridgepole  and  some  chimneys." 

Later  in  the  same  symphony  the  repeated  recur- 
rence of  a  certain  horn-phrase  elicited  from  him  : 

— ( '  It  seems  to  me  as  if  Mr.  ,"  naming  the 

composer,  "  must  find  that  very  beautiful  ! " 

Yet  it  was  owing  to  an  impetuous  temper  and 
an  almost  too  ardent  faith  in  his  convictions  that 
he  sometimes  gave  offence,  rather  than  to  any  in- 
nate want  of  tact.  Very  undiplomatic  and  wholly 
transparent  he  certainly  was,  and  the  truth — or 
what  he  saw  as  truth — took  so  fierce  a  hold  upon 
him  that  he  often  seemed  to  see  nothing  else.  His 
mind  worked  unswervingly  toward  one  point,  and 
in  expressing  himself  earnestly,  at  times  even  vio- 
lently, he  forgot  personal  considerations  ;  but  no 
one  could  be  more  surprised  and  grieved  than  he 


266  TWO  MODERN   CLASSICISTS 

when  he  found  he  had  hurt  any  one's  feelings,  or 
had  been  thought  to  bear  personal  ill  will.  On 
the  other  hand,  his  tact  in  musical  matters  was 
often  wonderful  :  the  way  in  which  he,  when  con- 
ducting rehearsals,  coaxed  his  chorus  to  conquer 
difficulties  and  managed  every  singer  who  came 
under  his  influence  was  simply  perfect.  Singers 
felt  they  were  doing  their  very  best  with  him  ;  he 
never  let  them  for  a  moment  feel  overtired,  dissa- 
tisfied, or  discouraged,  and  was  as  careful  that  ev- 
erything they  sang  should  be  effective  for  them 
and  those  who  heard  them  as  he  was  that  it  should 
be  good.  To  bore  people,  to  be  socially  or  musi- 
cally tedious,  was  for  him  an  idea  full  of  horror  ; 
he  would  really  suffer  at  having  what  he  thought 
a  tiresomely  put-together  program  ascribed  to  him 
as  his  work. 

Dresel  was  a  firm  believer  in  the  conscious  pow- 
er of  genius,  and  scouted  the  idea  that  the  process 
of  artistic  creation  goes  on  without  the  creator's 
understanding  it.  He  would  often  say  that  the 
really  great  things  were  always  written,  not  by  any 
happy  accident,  but  distinctly  on  purpose,  and 
with  a  perfect  knowledge  on  the  writer's  part  of 
how  and  why  they  were  great.  He  emphatically 
denied  that  a  truly  great  genius  was  at  the  mercy 
of  his  inspiration  ;  affirming,  on  the  contrary,  that 
a  man  was  master  of  his  inspiration  in  direct  pro- 


TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS  267 

portion  with  the  greatness  of  his  genius.  "  It  is 
the  little  men  who  now  and  then  do  fine  things  by 
accident,  and  without  knowing  how  they  do  them ; 
the  true  masters  always  know  what  they  are 
about." 

As  a  pianist,  Dresel  was  one  of  the  most  inspi- 
ring players  I  ever  listened  to.  He  was  seldom  at 
his  best  in  public,  being  essentially  what  Berlioz 
called  "an  artist  of  the  drawing-room."  His  ex- 
treme nervousness,  his  insatiate  self-criticism,  his 
exalted  idea  of  an  artist's  responsibility,  all  mili- 
tated against  his  being  in  good  form  on  public  oc- 
casions for  which  he  had  gone  through  a  long 
course  of  preparation.  On  such  occasions  he  was 
too  frequently  what  athletes  call  "stale," — over- 
trained, with  his  nervous  irritability  in  excess  over 
his  self-command.  In  this  respect  he  was  very 
like  Adolf  Henselt,  who  gave  up  playing  in  public 
early  in  his  long  artistic  career.  Dresers  best 
playing  was  done  in  private,  when  asked  to  play 
on  the  spur  of  the  moment — better  still  when  he 
offered  to  play  of  his  own  accord.  Then  his  play- 
ing would  reach  the  very  acme  of  inspiring  beauty 
and  vital  force.  For  true  genius  at  white  heat,  yet 
controlled  by  the  finest  artistic  sense  of  measure,  I 
have  never  heard  his  best  playing  surpassed  by  any 
of  the  greatest  pianists.  Eubinstein  himself  could 
not  outbid  the  afflatus  with  which  Dresel  would 


268  TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS 

play  at  times.  He  had  an  incisiveness  and  bril- 
liancy of  tone,,  a  vigour  of  accent,  that  carried  ev- 
erything before  them.  If  his  playing  lacked  any 
fine  quality,  it  was  perhaps  that  of  suavity ;  as 
somebody  once  said  of  him,  he  played  as  if  the 
keys  were  red-hot.  Like  Gottschalk,  he  had  the 
peculiar  power  of  producing  a  brilliant,  ringing 
quality  of  tone  even  in  the  softest  pianissimo. 
But  his  career  as  a  concert  pianist  belongs  to  the 
first  half  of  his  life. 

Dresel's  musical  influence  upon  those  who  came 
in  contact  with  him  was  of  the  finest.  To  be  sure, 
the  circle  of  those  who  came  under  it  was  more 
and  more  restricted  as  he  grew  older.  Perhaps 
he  himself  unconsciously  contracted  it.  He  had 
lived  to  see  Mendelssohn,  Schumann,  and  Chopin 
well  installed  in  their  normal  position  in  the  esti- 
mation of  the  Boston  public  ;  Haydn,  Mozart,  and 
Beethoven  had  always  been  held  in  honour ;  and 
the  only  field  for  musical  propagandism  left  him 
was  to  encourage  the  cult  of  Bach  and  Handel. 
To  preach  Bach  and  Handel  in  Boston — or  any- 
where else,  for  matter  of  that — was  to  preach  to 
few  listeners.  Handel,  to  be  sure,  had  long  been 
popular  ;  at  least  the  Messiah,  Samson,  Israel  in 
Egypt,  and  some  few  of  his  other  oratorios  had 
been  ;  but  Dresel's  ideas  of  doing  full  justice  to 
the  works  of  the  great  master  differed  widely  from 


TWO  MODERN  CLASSICISTS  269 

the  current  traditional  ones,  and  his  attempts  to 
propagate  them  were,  oftener  than  not,  resented 
by  people  who  thought  years  of  routine  had 
taught  them  all  they  needed  to  know  about  Han- 
del, and  the  general  public  were  loath  to  welcome 
any  influence  that  should  disturb  them  in  their 
old  habits.  With  Bach,  again,  Dresers  work  of 
propagandism  was  more  difficult  still ;  there  was 
no  popular  interest  in  Bach  of  any  sort,  and  what 
people  did  hear  of  him  did  not  particularly  attract 
them.  In  fact,  music-lovers  in  general  felt  more 
and  more  like  letting  Dresel  have  his  Bach  and 
Handel  to  himself,  and  not  bothering  their  own 
heads  about  the  two  old  masters.  Dresel  became 
more  and  more  exclusively  associated  with  them  in 
people's  minds,  as  a  man  who  cared  for  little  or 
nothing  else  in  music,  and  was  consequently  more 
and  more  looked  upon  as  one  whose  mental  bias 
made  him  out  of  touch  with  the  present  musical 
world  at  large.  His  well-known  opposition  not 
only  to  Berlioz,  Liszt,  and  Wagner,  but  to  Raff, 
Rubinstein,  Goldmark,  Brahms,  and  others  of  the 
newer  schools,  only  increased  the  distrust  with 
which  most  people  regarded  his  opinions.  In  a 
word,  he  preached  more  and  more  in  the  desert, 
and  fewer  and  fewer  music-lovers  were  inclined  to 
listen  to  him. 

It  was  during  only  the  last  few  years  of  his  life 


270  TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS 

that  a  happy  circumstance  enabled  him  once  more 
to  exert  directly  the  influence  he  had  always  been 
most  anxious  to  exert, — upon  a  small  circle,  it  is 
true,  but  where  it  could  bring  forth  some  good 
fruit,  and  not  be  wholly  wasted.  This  was  the 
formation  of  the  Bach  Club :  a  choir  of  picked 
singers,  many  of  them  professional,  who  met  at 
his  house  every  Monday  evening  during  the  winter 
to  practise  choruses  by  Bach  and  Handel  under  his 
direction,  accompanied  by  himself  on  the  piano- 
forte, with  a  firmer  background  of  tone  supplied 
by  a  small  pipe-organ  he  had  had  built  in  his  mu- 
sic-room, which  was  played  on  these  occasions  by 
competent  organists.  Sometimes  whole  cantatas 
would  be  rehearsed,  recitatives,  arias,  and  all, — for 
some  of  the  best  singers  in  the  city  were  members 
of  the  club.  Twice  or  three  times  in  the  winter 
some  twenty  or  thirty  musical  friends  would  be 
invited  to  hear  a  "  performance  ; "  and  the  musi- 
cal influence  of  the  club  thus  extended  to  a  larger 
circle.  Although  the  scheme  did  not  include  any 
sort  of  orchestra,  the  conditions  for  musical  effect 
were  peculiarly  and  exceptionally  fine  :  that  small 
and  carefully  drilled  chorus,  singing  in  a  room 
where  the  volume  and  vitality  of  tone  suffered 
nothing  from  evaporation,  the  generally  fine  qua- 
lity of  the  individual  voices, — on  this  point  Dresel 
was  exceedingly  fastidious, — and  the  contagious, 


TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS  271 

masterly  vigour  with  which  the  pianoforte  accom- 
paniments were  played,  together  with  the  firm 
bass  of  the  organ  pedals,  all  united  to  make  these 
performances,  especially  of  the  things  by  Bach, 
overwhelmingly  impressive.  All  who  had  the  good 
luck  to  be  present  at  these  gala  evenings  of  the 
Bach  Club  could  count  them  among  the  high  tides 
of  their  musical  experience.  The  best  part  of  the 
influence  was  upon  the  singers  themselves.  Few 
of  them  joined  the  club  with  great  expectations  of 
enjoyment,  and  many  were  induced  to  come  at  first 
more  because  they  were  invited  than  for  any  other 
reason.  But  the  overmastering  charm  of  DreseFs 
personality,  his  communicative  enthusiasm,  and 
the  new  insight  he  gave  them  into  the  unaccus- 
tomed music  held  them  fast.  I  have  never  spoken 
with  a  member  of  the  club,  no  matter  how  slight 
his  previous  interest  in  Bach  may  have  been,  who 
did  not  count  these  evenings  at  Dresel's  house  as 
the  most  valuable  and  inspiring  fact  in  his  artistic 
education.  The  influence  was  doubtless  upon  a 
small  circle  ;  but  it  was  of  the  very  best  imagi- 
nable, and  an  intelligent  nucleus  is  always  worth 
cultivating.  Here  were  at  least  twenty-four  or 
thirty  singers  who  had  been  led  on  to  find  Bach 
and  Handel  not  merely  interesting  and  instructive, 
but  a  genuine  source  of  musical  enthusiasm  and 
excitement.     That  was  surely  worth  while.     And 


272  TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS 

it  may  well  be  doubted  whether  any  very  fruitful 
influence,  of  just  the  right  sort,  could  have  been 
exerted  in  favour  of  a  Bach  or  Handel  propaganda 
in  any  other  way.  Those  great  masters,  notably 
Bach,  were  essentially  musical  aristocrats;  they 
may  be  taken  as  supreme  examples  of  what  Franz 
wrote  in  one  of  his  letters  to  me  : 

' '  Art,  as  the  noblest  blossom  of  every  age,  is  in  its  very 
nature  aristocratic  through  and  through,  and  must  therefore 
not  deport  itself  democratically  in  those  of  its  achievements 
that  aim  at  being  monumental." 

A  Bach  and  Handel  propaganda,  especially  now- 
adays, can  hope  to  be  truly  and  rightly  efficient 
only  in  small  circles ;  happy  the  propagandist  of 
this  high  cult  if  he  can  get  a  few  willing  listeners 
to  heed  him  and  try  to  understand  his  teaching  ! 
In  this  way  a  nucleus  of  intelligent  enthusiasm 
may  be  formed,  and  that  nucleus  may  perhaps 
grow  with  time.  Other  hope  of  initiating  the 
world  into  the  higher  and  more  sacred  mysteries 
of  Bach's  and  HandeFs  art  there  seems  at  present 
to  be  none. 

Here  we  have,  to  my  mind,  the  most  valuable 
part  of  the  life-work  of  both  Franz  and  Dresel, — 
the  work  they  did  toward  promoting  a  right  under- 
standing of  the  genius  and  works  of  Bach  and  Han- 
del ;  sweeping  away,  as  far  as  they  were  able,  the 


TWO   MODERN   CLASSICISTS  273 

accumulated  rubbish  of  ever  deteriorating  tradi- 
tion and  routine  stupidity  under  which  the  art 
legacy  of  these  two  supreme  masters  had  lain  half 
hidden  for  generations,  and  bringing  its  true  worth 
and  significance  to  the  light  of  day.  Their  best 
work  was  to  "exclude  trash,  and  let  what  was 
genuine  come  into  its  rights."  And  of  all  men  of 
their  day,  they  were  the  best  fitted  for  the  task. 

18 


JOHN  SULLIVAN  DWIGHT 


JOHN  SULLIVAN  DWIGHT 

The  remarkable  man  who  has  just  passed  away 
was  one  of  the  most  unique  figures  Boston  has  ever 
claimed  as  her  own.  Men  of  naturally  fine  and 
sensitive  artistic  nature,  yet  without  productive 
promptings,  are  not  very  uncommon  ;  neither  is  it 
very  seldom  that  we  find  a  man  of  this  sort  who 
has  been  content  to  develop  his  aesthetic  bent  in  a 
wholly  general  way,  without  giving  much  heed  to 
the  minutiae  of  special,  quasi-technical  cultivation 
in  any  particular  direction.  But  it  is  exceedingly 
seldom  that  one  finds  such  a  man  pass  a  long  life 
in  intimate,  almost  daily,  communion  with  litera- 
ture and  the  fine  arts,  and  preserve  intact  all  the 
native  spontaneity  and  naivete  of  his  feelings,  so 
that  he  remains  quite  free  from  any  taint  of  self- 
conscious  dilettantism,  and  wholly  uninfluenced 
by  merely  artificial  standards. 

What  most  made  D wight  remarkable  was  his 
inveterate  instinct  for  culture — as  distinguished 
from  mere  learning.  Perhaps  it  may  have  been 
in  a  large  measure  a  certain  unconquerable  mental 


278  JOHN   SULLIVAN  D  WIGHT 

indolence  that  prompted  him  always  to  take  the 
royal  road  in  everything,  to  skip  lightly  over  the 
dry  rudiments  of  every  study, — or  what  to  men 
otherwise  disposed  would  have  been  study, — and 
absorb  immediately  what  he  could  of  its  final  es- 
sence. Mentally  indolent  he  certainly  was  to  a 
high  degree;  he  abominated  work;  the  necessity 
for  work  seemed  to  him,  upon  the  whole,  a  sad 
mistake  in  the  scheme  of  the  universe.  And, 
though  he  did  a  good  deal  of  it,  first  and  last,  in 
the  course  of  his  life,  it  was  never  otherwise  than 
irksome  to  him  ;  he  worked,  as  it  were,  under  pro- 
test. Yet,  making  all  due  allowance  for  this  men- 
tal indolence  of  his,  one  must  recognize  also  that 
his  inveterate  longing  for  complete  intellectual 
digestion  and  assimilation  led  him,  as  by  an  inborn 
instinct,  to  bring  his  mind  to  bear  only  upon  what 
was  really  digestible  and  assimilable  by  it.  He 
felt  that  mere  knowledge,  or  half -knowledge,  was 
of  no  genuine  use  to  a  man,  that  only  that  know- 
ledge which  has  become  so  thoroughly  part  and 
parcel  of  the  man's  own  self  as  to  be  convertible 
into  feeling  and  instinct  is  really  valuable.  So  he 
threw  open  his  mental  receptivity  only  in  the  di- 
rections whence  intellectual  or  artistic  experiences 
would  come  of  themselves  to  meet  it,  and  leave 
their  indelible  trace  on  the  retina  of  his  mind  of 
their  own  accord  and  without  effort  on  his  part. 


JOHN  SULLIVAN  DWIGHT  279 

What  he  got  in  this  way  he  did  completely  and 
thoroughly  digest ;  it  was  absorbed  into  his  very 
being  and  became  a  functional  part  of  himself. 

None  but  the  most  absolutely  genuine,  true, 
and  indestructible  artistic  nature  could  have  gone 
through  life  on  such  a  plan  without  inevitable 
ruin ;  but  Dwight  got  no  harm  from  it,  the  pure 
gold  of  his  aesthetic  sense  was  only  more  and  more 
refined  by  the  ordeal.  His  naivete  of  perception, 
his  ever  youthful  enthusiasm,  his  ineradicable 
power  of  enjoyment,  held  out  unimpaired  to  the 
end.  What  he  was,  he  was  genuinely  and  tho- 
roughly ;  fashion  had  no  hold  on  him,  and  his  re- 
finement never  had  a  touch  of  dandyism  nor  finical 
affectation. 

D  wight's  artistic  gift  was  of  a  very  general  sort. 
His  choice  of  Music  from  among  the  fine  arts  as 
his  daily  companion  through  life  was  undoubtedly 
less  owing  to  any  special  aptitude  than  to  the  ex- 
traordinary vividness  and  intensity  with  which 
musical  impressions  affect  almost  all  artistic  na- 
tures. Music  was  the  art  which  could  be  enjoyed 
most  intensely,  immediately,  and  with  the  least 
effort ;  so  he  took  to  Music.  What  Carlyle  called 
that  "kind  of  inarticulate,  unfathomable  speech, 
which  leads  us  to  the  edge  of  the  infinite,  and  lets 
us  for  moments  gaze  into  that,"  was  just  the  art 
of  all  others   to    appeal    most    irresistibly  to  a 


280  JOHN  SULLIVAN  DWIGHT 

dreamy,  sybaritic,  intellectually  luxurious  nature 
like  D wight's.  His  'life-long  communion  with  it 
was,  as  it  were,  predestined. 

Of  specifically  musical  organization  he  had  ex- 
tremely little  ;  his  only  native  aptitude  for  the  art 
consisted  in  what  is  commonly  called  u  a  fair  ear  " 
and  general  aesthetic  sensibility.  It  may  be  doubted 
whether  he  ever  really  studied  music  ;  his  techni- 
cal knowledge  of  the  art  was  always  slight.  He 
could  read  notes  and  work  his  way  through  piano- 
forte scores  on  that  instrument,  although  he  never 
even  began  (or  tried  to  begin)  to  master  its  tech- 
nique. When  in  college  he  played  the  clarinet  a 
little  in  the  Pierian  Sodality ;  he  had  a  certain, 
rather  superficial  knowledge  of  the  rudiments  of 
harmony,  and  a  somewhat  more  exact  and  extend- 
ed acquaintance  with  the  rules  of  musical  form. 
His  knowledge  of  musical  terminology,  however, 
was  comprehensive  and  accurate, — astonishingly 
so  in  one  whose  technical  knowledge  of  the  art 
was  so  incomplete.  He  never  developed  anything 
that  could  fairly  be  called  musical  facility;  he 
never  handled  musical  notation  with  the  ease  of  a 
craftsman,  and  always  found  some  difficulty  in 
following  performances  from  the  score,  especially 
when  things  went  at  a  rapid  tempo.  His  naturally 
musical  ear  never  developed  to  more  than  an  ave- 
rage pitch  of  delicacy ;  technical  slips  seldom  dis- 


JOHN  SULLIVAN   DWIGHT  281 

turbed  him,  and  "rough  performances"  fully  sa- 
tisfied him,  if  only  the  right  spirit  was  there. 

Yet,  with  and  in  spite  of  all  this,  his  musical 
instincts  and  perceptions  were,  in  a  certain  high 
respect,  of  the  finest.  He  was  irresistibly  drawn 
toward  what  is  pure,  noble,  and  beautiful,  and  felt 
these  things  with  infinite  keenness  ;  he  had  an  in- 
born and  unconquerable  horror  of  the  merely  gran- 
diose, of  what  is  big  without  being  great,  of  the 
factitiously  intense,  of  the  trivial  and  vulgar.  He 
was  an  optimist,  through  and  through,  and  wished 
all  art  to  be  as  optimistic  as  himself;  what  was 
morbid  had  little  attraction  for  him,  and  the  di- 
vinities he  most  worshipped  were  the  "healthy, 
eupeptic  "  composers :  Bach,  Handel,  Haydn,  Mo- 
zart, Gluck,  Beethoven,  Schubert,  Weber,  and 
Mendelssohn.  Of  the  more  morbidly  sensitive  and 
analytically  introspective  composers  he  could  sym- 
pathize only  with  those  in  whom  he  found  morbid 
sensibility  constantly  cured  and  atoned  for  by  im- 
maculate beauty  and  perfect  clarity  of  expression, 
such  as  Schumann  and  Chopin.  His  utter  dis- 
taste for  music  of  the  more  modern  schools,  for 
Berlioz,  Liszt,  Wagner,  and  even  Kan*  and  Brahms, 
has  too  often  been  ascribed  to  sheer  prejudice.  No 
doubt  prejudice  did  play  some  part  in  the  matter  : 
these  modern  men  came  upon  Dwight  somewhat 
late  in  life,  when,  although  he  retained  all  his 


282  JOHN   SULLIVAN  DWIGHT 

naivete  and  enthusiasm,  his  musical  receptivity 
had  become  to  a  certain  extent  anchylosed  into 
immobility,  and  he  found  it  difficult  to  throw  off 
old  habits  and  adopt  new  points  of  view.  But 
there  was  nevertheless  a  deeper  and  more  solid 
ground  for  his  abhorrence  of  these  composers  :  the 
whole  essentially  modern  spirit  which  pervades 
their  work,  with  all  its  high-strung  nervous  en- 
ergy, restless  striving,  and  lack  of  serenity  and 
repose,  the  way  their  music  reflects  the  character- 
istic strenuousness  and  turmoil  of  modern  life, 
were  totally  antipathetic  to  his  nature.  He  was 
essentially  a  Hellene  and  an  idealist ;  any  too 
drastic  and  realistic  presentation  of  the  morbid 
side  of  life  shocked  his  finer  sensibilities  and 
seemed  to  him  unworthy  of  the  sacredness  of 
Art. 

Upon  the  whole,  Dwight  was  a  man  considerably 
astray  in  this  nineteenth  century  of  ours,  with  its 
hurry,  bustle,  and  fierce  struggle  for  existence ; 
if  he  could  sympathize  with  and  honour  its  aims, 
he  thoroughly  detested  its  methods,  and  could 
never  be  brought  to  see  that  these  methods  were 
the  necessary  outgrowth  of  its  aims.  Beauty  and 
ideality  were  to  him  the  only  important  realities  ; 
what  was  merely  practical  and,  as  the  common 
phrase  goes,  "  useful "  seemed  to  him  superfluous 
and  impertinent.     It  is  related  of  him  that,  when 


JOHN  SULLIVAN  DWIGHT  283 

the  building  in  which  he  lived  at  Brook  Farm  took 
fire  and  was  burned  to  the  ground,  he  straightway 
ran  up  to  the  top  of  a  neighbouring  hillock  and 
was  lost  in  ecstasy  at  the  beauty  of  the  flames 
against  the  dark  sky.  The  anecdote  is  sharply 
characteristic  !  Of  what  is  called  nowadays  "  en- 
terprise "  he  had  no  conception ;  for  mere  Athe- 
nian curiosity,  the  common  greed  for  accumulating 
indigestible  facts,  he  had  the  supremest  contempt. 
Probably  the  compliment  paid  his  paper,  D wight's 
Journal  of  Music,  that  most  pleased  him  was  when 
Richard  Grant  White  once  wrote  him  that  it  was 
"not  a  newsy  paper — a  vile  phrase  for  a  viler 
thing ! "  He  was  never  in  a  hurry,  and  never 
could  understand  why  any  one  sliould  be. 

For  such  a  man  to  edit  a  paper  of  any  sort  cer- 
tainly has  its  whimsical  side.  Yet,  if  we  look 
more  closely  into  the  matter  we  shall  see  that  it 
was  just  because  Dwight  was  what  he  was  that 
Dwight's  Journal  of  Music  was  so  admirable  a 
paper.  It  certainly  was  the  highest-toned  musical 
periodical  of  its  day,  all  the  world  over.  In  it 
Dwight's  fineness  of  artistic  instinct  and  his  un- 
flinching intellectual  honesty  found  adequate  ex- 
pression. He  has  often  been  praised  for  the  cour- 
age he  showed  in  standing  to  his  guns  as  he  did, 
through  thick  and  thin.  Indeed,  his  moral  cour- 
age was  something  wonderful,  and  all  the  more  so 


284  JOHN  SULLIVAN  DWIGHT 

for  being  wholly  unconscious ;  for  it  never  occurred 
to  him  that  it  took  any  "  courage  *  to  say  just  what 
he  thought,  utterly  regardless  of  consequences. 
Then  he  was  a  born  critic  in  the  highest  sense  ; 
not  a  man  whose  exact  technical  knowledge  of  his 
subject  enables  him  to  discourse  learnedly  and  ir- 
ref  ragably  on  it ;  not  one  whose  comparison  of  a 
work  of  art  with  acknowledged  standards  would 
be  academically  instructive ;  but  a  man  of  the 
keenest  perceptions  of  beauty  and  grandeur,  who 
could  make  you  see  the  beauty  he  saw,  and  make 
you  feel  with  him  the  grandeur  he  felt.  In  all 
criticism  there  is  perhaps  nothing  superior  to  his 
wonderful,  thrice  wonderful,  analysis  of  Mozart's 
Don  Giovanni  which  appeared  in  one  of  the  early 
issues  of  his  Journal  of  Music.  Well  might  Theo- 
dore Parker  (who,  by  the  way,  was  thoroughly 
unmusical)  exclaim  after  reading  it  :  "To  think 
of  a  man's  being  able  to  make  all  that  out  of  an 
opera  ! "  It  is  more  than  an  analytical  criticism  ; 
it  is  a  work  of  art ! 

Indeed,  Dwight's  specific  literary  faculty  was  as 
fine  as  that  of  any  born  American  who  ever  wrote  ; 
his  style  was  at  once  brilliant,  solid,  and  impec- 
cable ;  better  prose  than  his  it  were  hard  to  find 
anywhere ;  for  facility  and  neatness,  for  elegance, 
and  unforced  grace,  it  approached  that  of  the  best 
French  masters.     His  gift  for  writing  verse,  too, 


JOHN   SULLIVAN   DWIGHT  285 

was  conspicuous ;  and,  although  he  had  neither 
creative  genius  nor  promptings,  he  made  some  of 
the  best  translations  of  well-nigh  untranslatable 
German  poetry  in  existence.  No  one  else  has  suc- 
ceeded so  well  as  he,  when  at  his  best,  in  preser- 
ving the  aroma  of  some  of  Heine's  lyrics  in  an  Eng- 
lish version ;  though  probably  his  greatest  feat  in 
this  line  was  his  translation  of  Luther's  "  Ein9 
feste  Burg,"  in  which  he  dared  to  retain  all  the 
rugged,  masculine  strength  of  the  original.  He 
always  had  the  strength  of  his  convictions,  and 
this  showed  itself  quite  as  plainly  in  his  literary 
and  poetic  style  as  in  his  expression  of  opinion. 
He  had  the  faculty  of  finding  the  right  word,  and 
daring  to  use  it,  whatever  it  might  be.     How  his 

"  An'  were  this  world  of  devils  full, 
All  hungry  to  devour  us  ; 
Yet,  fearing  naught,  we  'U  stand  the  putt, 
They  shall  not  overpow'r  us !  " 

makes  all  other  current  versions  seem  like  rose- 
water  !  Here  you  feel  there  is  a  man's  hand  at 
the  bellows  !  You  hear  the  very  Luther  himself 
speak ! 

Personally  Dwight  was  the  most  genial  of  com- 
panions. His  inveterate  optimism,  his  sunny 
nature,  and  unspoilable  power  of  enjoyment  were 
contagious.     Few  men  probably  ever  enjoyed  life 


286  JOHN   SULLIVAN  DWIGHT 

as  he  did ;  to  him  life  was  all  roses,  with  never  a 
thorn, — save  perhaps  in  the  (to  him)  minor  matter 
of  Wagner,  Liszt  &  Co.  Whether  it  was  a  fine 
day,  a  fair  landscape,  a  poem,  a  Beethoven  sym- 
phony, or  a  lobster  salad  with  a  bottle  of  cham- 
pagne, his  enjoyment  of  it  was  something  wonder- 
ful to  contemplate  ;  and  external  conditions  had 
but  little  influence  upon  his  delight  in  the  good 
things  of  this  life — intellectual,  spiritual,  or  fleshly. 
Even  in  times  and  circumstances  that  would  have 
driven  other  men  to  the  brink  of  despair,  he  had 
an  alchemy  that  contrived  to  extract  some  pleasure 
from  the  most  unpromising  slag.  How  that  be- 
nign, intellectual,  sunlit  face  of  his  will  be  missed 
from  the  seat  in  the  first  balcony  of  the  Music 
Hall,  of  which  he  was  the  almost  never-failing  oc- 
cupant for  twenty-five  years  or  more  !  It  is  fitting 
that  the  Music  Hall  he  loved  should  go  with  him. 
May  both  rest  in  peace  ! 


SOME  THOUGHTS  ON  MUSICAI 
CRITICISM 


SOME  THOUGHTS  ON  MUSICAL 
CRITICISM 

It  has  long  been  a  matter  of  debate  what  the  true 
function  of  the  critic  is.  The  old  school  of  criti- 
cism was  evidently  troubled  by  no  doubts  on  this 
head;  the  critic  was,  in  the  fullest  sense  of  the 
term,  a  judge,  one  who  sat  in  judgment,  and  whose 
decrees,  delivered  ex  cathedra,  aimed  at  a  certain 
finality.  The  most  exhaustive  knowledge  and 
rigid  impartiality  were  necessarily  presupposed  ; 
the  critic,  thus  armed,  sought  to  determine  with 
categorial  precision  what  was  good  and  what  bad. 

This  school  of  criticism  has,  even  to-day,  many 
advocates.  It  is  not  long  since  I  read  somewhere 
that  there  are  two  kinds  of  critics  :  the  critic  who 
writes  what  he  thinks  he  knows,  and  the  one  who 
writes  what  he  knows  he  knows,  and  that  only  the 
latter  should  have  any  real  authority.  Authority — 
perhaps  !  but  it  is  a  question  in  my  mind  whether 
a  critic  should  properly  have  any  authority  at  all. 
Dogmatic  and  authoritative  criticism  would  be  all 
very  well,  if  the  critic  were  possessed  of  one  thing 
19 


290      THOUGHTS   ON  MUSICAL   CRITICISM 

— Omniscience  !  For,  without  this,  his  field  is 
singularly  circumscribed,  or  else  his  position  an  ex- 
ceedingly ticklish  one.  Just  how  much  can  a  mu- 
sical critic  claim  to  ' '  know  he  knows  "  about  a 
composition  or  performance  ?  In  my  opinion,  very 
little  indeed.  He  may  know  whether  the  music  is 
correctly  written,  or  not,  according  to  traditional 
rules  ;  whether  the  performance  is  in  time  and 
tune,  or  not ;  whether  the  singer  pronounces  the 
words  of  the  text  distinctly,  or  unintelligibly. 
Such  hard-pan  facts  he  can  fairly  claim  to  know. 
But  all  that  lies  outside  and  beyond  such  facts  is  a 
matter  of  opinion  ;  and  opinion,  though  never  so 
well  founded,  is  not  certainty.  And,  if  the  chief 
aim  of  musical  criticism  is  to  raise  the  standard  of 
musical  performance  and  popular  musical  apprecia- 
tion,— as  I  firmly  believe  it  to  be, — a  mere  detail- 
ing of  absolutely  knowable  facts  is  of  little  use. 
That  is  reporter's  work,  not  criticism  in  any  high 
sense  of  the  word. 

To  my  mind,  criticism  should  be  nothing  but  an 
expression  of  enlightened  opinion, — as  enlightened 
as  possible,  but  never  dogmatic.  What  the  critic 
knows  is  valuable  to  himself  mainly  ;  it  is  what  he 
thinks  and  feels  that  is  valuable  to  others.  And  it 
is  extremely  important  that  the  public,  who  read 
criticism,  should  know  with  whom  they  have  to 
deal.     This  is  one  reason  why  I  so  much  like  the 


THOUGHTS  ON  MUSICAL  CRITICISM      291 

French  style  of,  so  -  called,  personal  criticism ; 
where  the  critic  writes  over  his  own  signature, 
gives  his  own  opinions  for  what  they  are  worth,  and 
fights  for  his  own  ideas.  Very  likely  he  may  be 
biassed,  one-sided,  a  partisan  of  some  particular 
school,  purblind  to  merits  of  a  certain  sort,  and 
over-prone  to  admire  virtues  of  another  description. 
But  no  matter  for  that,  his  readers  will  find  him 
out  soon  enough,  and  know  what  allowances  to 
make.  And,  with  this  tacit  understanding,  the 
critic  can  feel  himself  free  ;  he  can  extol  the  merits 
that  seem  to  him  conspicuous  and  praiseworthy, 
blame  the  faults  that  set  his  teeth  on  edge ;  in  a 
word,  state  his  own  side  of  the  case  with  that 
vigour  of  enthusiasm  without  which  all  writing 
lacks  savour  and  vitality.  He  stands  admittedly  as 
a  representative  of  nothing  but  his  own  ideas  ;  and 
he  is  enabled  to  place  these  in  the  strongest  light. 
What  he  writes  will  be  truly  alive  and  suggestive  ; 
it  will  set  people  thinking  ;  and  this  is  perhaps  the 
very  best  thing  any  criticism  can  do.  What  of  it, 
if  he  see  only  one  side  of  a'  question  ?  He  is  not 
the  only  critic  in  the  world,  and  may  be  sure 
there  will  be  plenty  of  others  to  take  up  the  other 
side.  He  may  leave  that  part  of  the  business  to 
them  with  perfect  safety ;  for  they  will  do  it  far 
better  than  he.  I  insist  upon  it  that,  in  a  matter 
where  thought  and  feeling  are  so  intimately  com- 


292      THOUGHTS   ON  MUSICAL   CRITICISM 

bined  as  in  our  relations  to  the  art  of  music, 
nothing  is  really  worth  writing  that  is  not  strongly 
felt  by  the  writer ;  and,  although  he  may  be  able 
to  reason  on  both  sides  of  a  question,  his  feelings 
and  sympathies  will  pretty  surely  be  only  on  one 
side. 

I  would  by  no  means  be  understood  to  imply  that 
u  personal "  criticism,  the  expression  of  personal 
opinion,  should  be  in  any  way  a  careless  or  thought- 
less business.  Criticism  should  be  something  far 
more  serious  and  profound  than  the  recording  of 
mere  momentary  impressions.  The  only  true  point 
of  departure  for  musical  criticism  is  an  accurate 
perception  of  the  music  or  performance  to  be  cri- 
ticised ;  and  such  a  perception  can  in  no  important 
case  be  arrived  at  carelessly.  The  critic's  first 
aim  should  be  to  show  the  thing  as  he  sees  it,  and, 
the  farther  he  sees  into  it,  the  better.  If  he  see  no 
farther  than  his  readers  do,  he  will  be  read  only  as 
long  as  they  agree  with  him ;  but,  if  he  does  see 
farther,  and  makes  it  plain  that  he  does,  he  will  be 
read  at  any  rate. 

It  has  often  been  said  that  it  is  one  of  the  musical 
critic's  duties  to  encourage  young  talent ;  if  this 
means  anything,  it  means  that  he  should  help  to 
make  the  path  to  fame  and  fortune  easy  for  new 
composers  and  performers.  It  seems  to  me,  how- 
ever, that  this  idea  has  been  somewhat  unduly 


THOUGHTS   ON  MUSICAL   CRITICISM      293 

emphasized.  I  can  not  see  that,  in  so  far  as  regards 
encouragement,  the  critic  has  any  duty  beyond  en- 
couraging what  he  deems  worthy.  Nay,  more  than 
this,  I  think  young  talent  in  general  is  something 
against  which  it  behooves  the  critic  to  be  some- 
what on  his  guard.  This  may  sound  hard-hearted, 
but  I  thoroughly  believe  it.  A  young  composer 
may  say  : 

— "I  feel  I  have  talent,  and  my  friends  agree 
with  me ;  I  have  devoted  years  to  the  hardest  and 
sincerest  study,  all  my  best  energies  have  been 
given  to  my  art ;  my  aim  has  been  steadily  high. 
I  have  had  to  fight  my  own  way,  to  scrape  to- 
gether, dollar  by  dollar,  the  money  my  musical 
education  has  cost  me,  and  have  endured  many 
privations ;  it  seems  to  me,  then,  that  all  this 
earnest  and  single-hearted  endeavour  entitles  me 
to    .     .     ." 

— "  My  dear  young  friend,"  I  reply,  "  it  entitles 
you  to  an  enviable  place  in  the  Kingdom  of  Heaven 
and  the  admiring  respect  of  all  who  know  you  on 
earth.  But  it  is  with  the  exact  value  of  the  results 
of  your  work  that  I,  as  a  critic,  have  to  do,  and 
with  this  only.  If  your  work  is  good,  it  shall  be 
my  highest  privilege  to  point  out  its  excellence ; 
but,  if  it  is  not  good,  it  is  merely  an  encumbrance 
on  the  face  of  the  earth,  the  world  needs  it  not, 
and  it  must  go  the  way  of  all  useless  things." 


294      THOUGHTS   ON  MUSICAL  CKITICISM 

Success  should  be  to  the  strong  alone  ;  and  they, 
thank  heaven  !  can  win  it  for  themselves.  And  it 
is  for  the  strong  man  to  prove  himself  strong  ;  it  is 
nobody  else's  business.  I  would  have  all  critics 
who  have  encouraged  the  weaklings  of  arts ' '  though, 
peradventure,  /  stand  accountant  for  as  great  a 
sin,"  indicted  for  compounding  a  public  nuisance. 
Composers,  players,  and  singers  must  stand  or  fall 
by  their  own  merits,  and  the  weak  go  to  the  wall. 

This  rigid  attitude  of  the  musical  critic  in  face 
of  young  talent,  which  I  so  strongly  advocate,  is  a 
very  different  thing  from  that  persecution  of  men 
of  genius  by  critics,  of  which  we  have  heard  more 
than  a  little.  Persecution  is  perhaps  a  rather  big 
word  for  it ;  but  let  it  pass.  Although  it  is  one  of 
the  duties  of  criticism  not  to  stand  between  weak 
things  and  their  natural  destiny,  the  most  foolish 
and  futile  thing  criticism  can  do  is  to  try  to  op- 
pose the  success  and  welfare  of  what  has  shown  it- 
self strong.  No  doubt  the  critic  should  be  true  to 
his  convictions,  and  a  dash  of  wholesome  conserva- 
tism in  him  does  no  harm  ;  for  he  plays  the  part 
of  fly-wheel  in  the  art-life  of  the  world,  not  that  of 
main-spring.  But  he  should  ever  be  on  the  alert 
to  recognize  genius  wherever  he  meets  it ;  and,  if 
the  manifestations  of  a  new  genius  seem  to  him  to 
stray  from  the  true  path  of  art,  then  is  the  time 
for  him  to  be  exceedingly  circumspect.     He  must 


THOUGHTS   ON   MUSICAL  CRITICISM      295 

remember  that  the  progress  of  music,  like  that  of 
the  other  fine  arts,  like  that  of  everything  in  this 
world,  is  essentially  an  evolution,  and  that  the 
path  this  evolution  has  followed  has  been,  and  ever 
will  be,  hewn  out  by  men  of  creative  genius,  and 
not  by  critics.  A  new  genius  may  so  comport  it- 
self as  to  shock  the  critic's  most  cherished  convic- 
tions as  to  what  is  true,  beautiful,  and  eternal  in 
music ;  but  let  him  think  twice  before  trying  to 
stem  its  course.  It  may  have  that  in  it  which  can 
scatter  all  his  arguments  to  the  four  winds,  and 
make  all  his  knowledge  and  cultured  taste  ridicu- 
lous. It  may  seem  to  him  monstrous  and  absurd  ; 
but,  if  it  shows  strength,  let  him  rather  try  to 
learn  from  it  the  secret  of  that  strength,  for  it  will 
be  a  lesson  worth  his  learning. 

It  is  of  no  use  trying  to  resist  the  onward  march 
of  a  Beethoven,  a  Schumann,  a  Berlioz,  or  a  "Wag- 
ner !  When  a  composer  is  strong  enough  to  sub- 
jugate a  quarter  of  the  world,  let  the  other  three- 
quarters  look  to  it,  for  their  time  may  come  at  any 
moment.  But,  if  any  hardly-treated  young  whip- 
per-snapper of  a  composer  cry  out  to  stern  criti- 
cism :  "  Hold  your  lash  !  For  aught  you  know  I 
may  be  the  '  coming  man/  a  Beethoven  or  Wagner 
in  embryo  ! "  Hm  ! — possibly  ;  but,  as  the  world 
goes,  the  chances  are  against  it.  At  all  events,  let 
the  young  whipper-snapper  first  prove  himself  to 


296      THOUGHTS   ON  MUSICAL   CRITICISM 

be  somebody,  first  conquer  bis  quarter  of  the 
world ;  then  will  be  the  time  for  criticism  to  take 
him  more  seriously. 

Upon  the  whole,  it  seems  to  me  that  the  critic 
should  not  write  for  the  benefit  of  the  artist, — com- 
poser or  performer, — but  mainly,  or  solely,  for  the 
benefit  of  the  public.  His  true  position  is  that  of 
interpreter  between  the  composer,  or  performer, 
and  the  public,  and  to  a  certain  extent  also  that  of 
guardian  of  popular  taste  ;  but  it  is  not  for  him  to 
try  to  play  schoolmaster  to  artists.  Artists  are,  as 
a  rule,  an  exceedingly  obstinate  and  stiff-necked 
generation,  and  have  but  little  regard  for  criticism, 
except  as  a  commercial  value.  If  they  are  earnest 
students,  they  feel — and  with  considerable  reason, 
too — that  they  know  their  business  quite  as  well  as 
the  critic ;  well-meant  advice  is  pretty  sure  to  be 
thrown  away  upon  them.  If,  on  the  other  hand, 
they  are  of  the  sort  that  aims  at  immediate  "  suc- 
cess *  at  all  hazards,  they  are  not  worth  the  critic's 
instructive  powder  and  shot.  I  think  that,  in  ge- 
neral, the  critic  can  easily  learn  more  from  artists 
than  they  are  likely  ever  to  learn  from  him.  A 
pretty  constant  intercourse  with  composers,  sing- 
ers, and  players  is  of  incalculable  value  to  the  mu- 
sical critic.  But  in  his  writing  it  is  with  the  pub- 
lic that  he  has  mainly,  if  not  wholly,  to  do.  It  is 
for  their  benefit  that  his  criticisms  should  be  writ- 


THOUGHTS   ON  MUSICAL   CRITICISM      297 

ten  ;  and,  if  lie  can  not  look  at  music  from  a  high- 
er and  more  comprehensive  point  of  view  than 
they,  he  is  no  man  for  his  place.  He  must  have 
finer  and  more  cultivated  musical  perceptions  than 
his  readers,  and  his  highest  function  should  be  to 
let  them — as  far  as  he  and  they  are  able — listen  to 
music  with  his  ears. 

But,  as  for  sitting  in  judgment  on  music,  like  an 
aesthetic  Rhadamanthus,  and  deciding  ex  cathedra 
that  this  is  good,  and  that  bad — this  seems  to  me 
about  as  preposterous  a  position  as  a  fallible  mortal 
can  well  assume  ;  and  in  this,  as  in  most  serious 
matters,  it  is  hard  to  be  preposterous  without  doing 
more  harm  than  good. 


MUSIC  AND  SCIENCE 


MUSIC  AND    SCIENCE 

True  musical  science  is  young  as  yet.  Probably 
no  other  one  of  the  fine  arts  has  been  subjected  to 
so  much  scientific,  or  would-be-scientific,  investiga- 
tion, has  been  made  the  theme  of  so  much  philo- 
sophical speculation,  as  Music.  Yet  there  is  pro- 
bably no  other  art,  the  history  of  which  shows  so  ap- 
palling a  picture  of  the  futility  of  speculative  theo- 
rizing. Though  the  history  of  Music  reveals  to  us, 
on  the  one  hand,  a  long  and  glorious  line  of  ex- 
amples of  the  creative  and  constructive  genius  of 
great  men,  it  also  shows  us  the  path  the  art  has 
travelled,  in  its  gradual  growth  and  development, 
as  strewn  from  end  to  end  with  the  inert  fragments 
of  exploded  theories.  I  doubt  if  the  history  of  any 
other  fine  art  appears  so  much  like  a  common 
dumping  -  ground  for  theoretical  rubbish.  Time 
and  time  again  have  philosophers  and  men  of  sci- 
ence done  their  best  to  set  up  some  theoretic  guide- 
post,  to  show  Music  what  course  was  properest  for 
her  to  pursue  ;  and  the  art  has,  in  most  instances, 
seemed  to  take  a  diabolical  delight  in    walking 


302  MUSIC   AND   SCIENCE 

straight  over  the  gnidepost.  In  hardly  a  single  case 
has  musical  theory  kept  pace  with  mnsical  practice  ; 
musical  art  has  far  outstripped  musical  science. 

This  is  by  no  means  to  be  wondered  at,  if  we 
make  perfectly  clear  to  ourselves  what  the  true 
nature  of  the  Science  of  Music  is.  The  Science  of 
Music,  properly  speaking,  is  much  of  the  same  na- 
ture as  the  so-called  natural  sciences  :  it  deals  with 
the  observation  and  classification  of  phenomena, 
and  the  discovery  of  the  laws  that  govern  them. 
It  may  be  said  that  the  ultimate  object  of  all  sci- 
ence is  the  discovery  of  law.  Music  is  the  oldest 
of  the  fine  arts,  though  it  had  an  exceedingly  long 
infancy  ;  Architecture,  Poetry,  Sculpture,  and 
Painting  were  born  later,  if  they  matured  earlier. 
But,  long  as  the  infancy  of  the  Art  of  Music  was, 
the  Science  of  Music  has  had  a  longer  one,  and  can 
hardly  be  said  to  be  quite  out  of  it  yet. 

This  disproportion  between  the  rate  of  growth  of 
the  art  itself  and  the  advance  of  the  science  which 
should  reveal  the  laws  of  its  growth  is  to  be  ex- 
plained, not  so  much  by  the  inherent  difficulty  and 
abstruseness  of  Music,  as  a  field  for  scientific  re* 
search,  as  by  the  faulty  and  inadequate  methods  by 
which  this  research  has  too  often  been  conducted. 
Music  has  been  made  too  much  the  theme  for  ab- 
stract deductive  reasoning.  The  deductive  method, 
which  starts  with  general  principles,  and  works 


MUSIC   AND   SCIENCE  303 

down  from  them  to  the  explanation  of  particular 
concrete  cases,  is  a  dangerous  scientific  tool ;  the 
temptation  it  offers  to  distort  the  statement  of 
facts,  so  as  to  make  them  accord  with  theory,  is 
often  irresistible.  Yet  this  method  is  the  one  upon 
which  scholastic  musical  science  has  most  implicitly 
relied.  Among  the  besetting  vices  of  this  method 
may  be  counted  the  prevailing  tendency  of  those 
who  employ  it  to  introduce  a  deal  of  irrelevant 
matter  into  their  discussion  of  problems.  Some  of 
the  conclusions  arrived  at  in  the  earlier  days  of 
musical  research  make  us  smile  now.  For  in- 
stance, this  :  that  triple  time  is  the  noblest  of  mu- 
sical rhythms,  because  there  are  three  persons  in 
the  Holy  Trinity  !  This  was  believed  once.  But, 
upon  the  whole,  the  worst  vice  of  scholastic  musical 
science — which  holds  by  the  deductive  method  as  it 
does  by  dear  life — has  been  its  readiness,  as  Dick- 
ens puts  it,  to  conjugate  itself  into  the  imperative 
mood  on  all  possible  occasions.  Instead  of  plum 
ging  straight  into  an  exhaustive  study  of  actual  mu- 
sical phenomena,  and  building  up  what  best  theory 
he  could  base  on  his  observation  thereof,  the  scholas- 
tic musical  scientist  was  wont  to  climb  some  philo- 
sophic Sinai,  and,  after  a  season  of  contemplation 
of  the  clouds,  come  down  again,  not  with  a  well- 
grounded  scientific  hypothesis,  but  with  a  table  of 
commandments.     It  is  to  be  remarked,  however, 


304  MUSIC   AND   SCIENCE 

that  this  sort  of  musical  Moses  was  generally  saved 
the  trouble  of  breaking  Ms  own  tables  ! 

True  Science  has  nothing  whatsoever  to  do  with 
the  imperative  mood  ;  it  concerns  itself  with  what 
is,  what  has  been,  and,  on  occasion,  with  what  will 
be.  And,  if  the  Science  of  Music  is  to  grow,  as 
this  nineteenth  century  of  ours  has  seen  other  sci- 
ences grow,  it  must  be  by  the  same  means.  The 
great  intellectual  triumph  of  this  century  has 
been  to  perfect  the  methods  of  scientific  research. 
The  inductive  method,  which  sets  out  with  a  close 
observation  of  actual  facts,  and  proceeds  therefrom 
to  the  building  up  of  well-founded  theories  of  the 
laws  which  govern  such  facts,  is  the  very  essence 
of  modern  Science.  Let  but  the  Science  of  Music 
trust  equally  to  a  rigid  employment  of  this  method, 
and  it  will  be  to  the  narrow  dogmatism  of  the  old 
scholastics  what  modern  Chemistry  is  to  mediaeval 
Alchemy  :  a  science  worthy  of  the  name. 

The  Art  of  Music  is  not,  like  Mathematics,  an 
ideal  chain  of  abstract  conceptions ;  it  is  the  sum 
of  all  the  music  that  has  been  sung,  played,  or 
written,  from  time  immemorial  down  to  the  pres- 
ent day.  And  the  Science  of  Music  has  not  pri- 
marily to  do  with  abstract  conceptions,  but,  like  the 
sciences  of  Chemistry,  Geology,  Astronomy,  Physi- 
ology, and  Biology,  and  quite  as  much  as  these, 
with  actual  phenomena.     No  doubt  it  is  true  that 


MUSIC  AND  SCIENCE  305 

one  science,  in  a  certain  sense,  rests  on  another, 
and  is  in  a  measure  to  be  explained  by  it.  In  this 
sense  it  may  be  said  that  Physiology  rests,  in  part, 
on  Physics.  I  once  heard  Dr.  Thomas  Dwight 
lecture  on  the  structure  of  bone ;  he  showed  how 
the  internal  structure  of  a  bone  was  in  accordance 
with  certain  physical  laws  governing  the  relations 
between  weight  and  support.  Thus  a  physiologi- 
cal law  was  explained  by  a  physical  law.  But  the 
physiological  law  was  not  discovered  by  making 
physical  experiments  ;  it  was  discovered  by  an  ex- 
tended series  of  observations  of  actual  bones,  that 
is,  of  purely  physiological  phenomena ;  the  Phy- 
sics was  brought  into  play  afterwards.  In  like 
manner,  recourse  must  be  had  to  Mathematics, 
if  the  physical  law  of  the  relations  between  weight 
and  support  is  thoroughly  to  be  explained.  But 
it  is  distinctively  characteristic  of  the  modern  sci- 
entist that,  whenever  he  finds  his  own  particular 
science  thus  resting  on  others,  he  begins  his  inves- 
tigations at  the  top  of  the  pile,  and  works  down- 
ward ;  he,  for  instance,  first  makes  sure  of  his 
physiological  law,  before  beginning  to  look  for  a 
physical  or  mathematical  explanation  of  it.  It 
was  the  old-school  scientist  who  used  to  begin  at 
the  bottom ;  and  he  generally  managed  to  topple 
the  whole  pile  over  by  the  time  he  had  reached  the 
second  story. 


306  MUSIC  AND  SCIENCE 

Now,  the  Art  of  Music  is  a  series  of  manifesta- 
tions of  something  through  the  medium  of  sound. 
Sound  is  the  material,  so  to  speak,  of  which  Music 
is  made  ;  so  the  Science  of  Music  must  rest,  in 
part  at  least,  on  Physical  Acoustics.  Again,  Mu- 
sic is  intended  to  be  heard  ;  so  the  Science  of  Mu- 
sic must  rest  also  on  Physiological  Acoustics. 
Furthermore,  Music,  being  something  more  than 
a  mere  irritation  of  the  auditory  nerves,  and  stri- 
king beyond  and  deeper  than  the  mere  perception 
of  sound,  appeals  to  the  higher  faculties  of  the 
mind ;  so  Musical  Science  must  also  rest  in  part 
on  Psychology.  Here  we  have  the  tripod  on  which 
the  Science  of  Music  reposes :  Psychology,  Physi- 
ology, and  Physics.  This  sounds  somewhat  differ- 
ent from  the  old  dictum  that  Music  was  nothing 
but  "  a  branch  of  Mathematics  \"  I  do  not  mean 
to  say  that  Musical  Science  can,  in  the  end,  dis- 
pense with  Mathematics ;  in  so  far  as  Music  rests 
on  Physics,  and  Physics  on  Mathematics,  just  so 
far — and  no  farther — will  Mathematics  come  into 
play  in  scientific  musical  research.  But,  if  we 
are  to  proceed  inductively,  we  must  begin  at  the 
top  of  the  pile ;  and  Mathematics  lies  way  down 
there,  under  Physics. 

I  have  said  that  the  Science  of  Music  rests 
on  the  sciences  of  Psychology,  Physiology,  and 
Physics.     But  it  is  all  -  important  to  remember 


MUSIC   AND   SCIENCE  307 

that,  although  based,  in  a  certain  sense,  on  these 
three  sciences,  it  is  not  identical  with  any  of  them  ; 
it  is  a  separate  science  in  itself.  This  fact  has  too 
often  been  forgotten.  I  remember  having  my  at- 
tention aroused  in  the  course  of  a  sermon,  one 
Sunday,  by  the  preacher's  making  the  astounding 
statement  that  Sir  Isaac  Newton  really  knew  more 
about  Music  than  Beethoven.  This  is  perhaps  as 
near  to  scientific  accuracy  as  it  is  necessary  for  a 
clergyman  to  come  ;  but,  in  truth,  I  should  as  soon 
think  of  saying  Professor  Trowbridge  knew  more 
about  the  Western  Union  Telegraph  Company  than 
Jay  Gould.  That  Newton  knew  more  about  Acous- 
tics than  Beethoven  is  highly  probable ;  but  Acous- 
tics is  only  the  science  of  sound,  and  sound  is  no 
more  Music  than  albumen,  gelatine,  and  the  phos- 
phate and  carbonate  of  lime  are  a  bone,  or  a  piece 
of  broadcloth  a  coat. 

As  the  discovery  of  natural  law  proceeds  from 
the  observation  of  natural  phenomena,  so  must 
the  discovery  of  musical  law  proceed  from  the 
observation  of  musical  phenomena,  that  is,  of  Mu- 
sic itself.  You  must  begin  with  learning  what 
has  actually  been  done  in  music ;  then  can  you  be- 
gin to  theorize.  Of  course,  I  do  not  mean  to  say 
that  we  should  utterly  abstain  from  forming  hy- 
potheses until  we  have  exhausted  the  entire  store 
of  musical  facts.     That  an  hypothesis  should  be 


308  MUSIC   AND   SCIENCE 

based  on  the  correct  observation  of  some  facts,  is 
indispensable  ;  a  tolerably  well-grounded  hypothe- 
sis holds  good  until  its  validity  is  disproved  ;  and, 
till  it  is  disproved,  it  is  often  a  serviceable  guide 
to  scientific  observation.  A  man  of  scientific  ge- 
nius does  not  always  need  to  observe  an  immensely 
long  chain  of  connected  phenomena  before  getting 
a  hint  at  the  law  behind  them  ;  and,  once  he  has 
got  this  hint,  he  knows  better  than  before  to  what 
point  to  direct  his  observations,  and  what  experi- 
ments to  make.  By  the  light  of  his  hypothesis  he 
finds  that  many  phenomena,  which  he  might  other- 
wise have  overlooked,  acquire  quite  a  new  signifi- 
cance. It  is  only  the  careless  propounding  of  hy- 
potheses, based  on  the  observation  of  insufficient, 
or  possibly  irrelevant,  facts,  that  I  would  depre- 
cate. A  clever  jump  at  a  musical  theory  may  be 
a  very  good  thing  in  its  way  ;  only  you  must  have 
some  solid  and  well-ascertained  musical  facts  to 
jump  from.  And  it  will  be,  upon  the  whole,  a 
saving  of  both  time  and  labour  to  make  sure  in  the 
beginning  of  the  exact  nature  of  the  phenomena 
you  take  for  your  point  of  departure.  Be  quite 
sure  that  they  are  really  musical  phenomena  ;  and 
remember  that,  when  you  have  once  taken  your 
jump,  the  very  next  thing  is  to  test  your  new  po- 
sition in  every  possible  way,  to  see  that  it  be  really 
tenable.     For  it  must  be  borne  in  mind  that  the 


MUSIC   AND   SCIENCE  309 

only  sufficient  proof  of  the  validity  of  a  musical 
theory,  of  its  being  the  correct  statement  of  a  mu- 
sical law,  is  its  being  found  to  be  in  harmony  with 
observed  musical  phenomena.  These  form  a  tri- 
bunal from  the  verdict  of  which  there  is  no  appeal ; 
they  are  inexorable. 

Your  musical  law  once  discovered,  its  persistent 
operation  once  thoroughly  ascertained,  it  may,  and 
probably  will,  be  necessary  to  call  one  or  more  of 
the  sciences  of  Psychology,  Physiology,  Physics, 
and  Mathematics  to  your  aid,  before  the  mode  of 
its  operation  can  be  fully  explained.  And  it  may, 
likely  enough,  happen  that  the  musical  phenomena 
you  have  observed  seem  to  jar  a  little  with  the 
known  principles  of  some  of  these  sciences.  But 
let  not  that  trouble  you  over-much ;  your  theory 
may  still  be  right.  To  return  once  more  to  my 
anatomical  simile,  I  am  sure  Dr.  Dwight  would 
tell  us  that,  given  a  complete  knowledge  of  the 
function  a  bone  is  to  perform,  and  of  the  physical 
principles  by  which  its  structure  should  be  regu- 
lated, any  decent  mechanic  would  follow  out  these 
principles  more  exactly  than  Nature  has  done.  Or- 
ganic growth  follows  out  the  general  scheme  of  phy- 
sical law  ;  but  with  a  certain  genial  freedom  in  the 
matter  of  detail.  Just  so  the  Art  of  Music  follows 
out  the  general  scheme  of  acoustical  law,  but  does 
not  always  bind  itself  to  the  precise  letter. 


310  MUSIC   AND  SCIENCE 

This  lack  of  absolute  exactness  in  the  way  Music 
carries  out  physical,  or  physiological,  principles 
makes  it  extremely  dangerous  to  base  a  musical 
theory  on  the  observation  of  purely  acoustical  phe- 
nomena. Probably  no  more  striking  example  of 
V  the  hazardousness  of  such  a  plan  can  be  found  than 

that  furnished  by  one  of  the  conclusions  Helmholtz 
arrives  at  in  his  Lehre  der  Tonempfindungen. 
Surely  Helmholtz  holds  a  position  in  the  world  of 
Science  which  forbids  of  any  of  his  conclusions 
being  attacked  without  the  greatest  circumspec- 
tion. His  investigations  have  been  conducted 
wholly  in  accordance  with  the  modern  scientific 
spirit ;  he  bases  his  theories  on  a  well-nigh  mira- 
culously acute  observation  of  phenomena,  and  his 
reasoning  is  as  flawless  as  his  observation.  The 
instance  is  a  singularly  instructive  one,  and  de- 
serves careful  examination. 

Helmholtz  tries  to  prove  that  the  musical  scale 
which  has  now  been  in  use  for  generations  and  ge- 
nerations, the  so-called  tempered  scale,  is  intrinsi- 
cally irrational  and  bad.  He  bases  his  proof  on  cer- 
tain perfectly  well-established  physical  and  physio- 
logical laws,  the  discovery  of  many  of  which  we  owe 
to  his  own  untiring  investigations.  He  says  the  tem- 
pered scale  is  bad,  because  every  note  in  it  is,  physi- 
cally speaking,  a  little  out  of  tune,  and  it  consequent- 
ly renders  the  formation  of  exact  concords  impossible. 


• 


MUSIC   AND   SCIENCE  311 

In  the  first  place,  I  may  be  pardoned  for  saying 
that  this  conclusion  of  Helmholtz's,  quite  apart 
from  its  truth  or  untruth,  seems  to  me  utterly  un- 
scientific in  its  very  nature.  The  tempered  scale 
is  a  musical  fact,  and  its  goodness,  or  badness,  is 
something  which  Helmholtz,  as  a  scientific  man, 
has  absolutely  no  business  to  call  in  question.  He 
has  no  more  scientific  right  to  find  fault  with  the 
tempered  scale  than  Professor  Huxley  would  have 
to  object  to  the  anatomy  of  the  horse. 

Some  years  ago  I  happened  to  read  a  newspaper 
article  in  which  the  writer  tried  to  prove  that  the 
bicycle  was  constructed  on  a  wholly  wrong  prin- 
ciple. The  argument  was  that,  as  the  crank  by 
which  the  wheel  is  turned  is  much  shorter  than  the 
spoke  of  the  wheel,  it  results  that  the  rider  virtu- 
ally applies  the  motive  force  to  the  short  arm  of  a 
lever,  instead  of  to  the  long  arm,  and  thus  suffers 
an  enormous  loss  of  power.  But  the  writer  forgot 
that  the  prime  object  of  the  bicycle  is  not  to  gain 
power,  but  speed  ;  it  is  not  made  to  draw  heavy 
weights,  but  to  carry  its  rider  at  a  very  rapid  pace. 
Its  mechanism  is  devised  solely  and  simply  with  a 
view  to  transforming  power  into  velocity.  Thus 
the  principle  of  its  construction  is  not  wrong,  but 
right  ! 

Helmholtz's  conclusion  regarding  the  tempered 
scale  seems  to  me  of  much  the  same  nature  as 


V 


312  MUSIC   AND   SCIENCE 

this  newspaper  correspondent's  error  about  the  bi- 
cycle. His  proof  hinges  on  the  assumption  that  the 
sine  qua  non  of  a  good  musical  scale  is  its  permit- 
ting of  the  formation  of  physically  and  mathemati- 
cally exact  concords ;  if  this  assumption  is  invali- 
dated, his  whole  proof  falls  to  the  ground  at  once. 
I  have  already  said  that,  to  my  mind,  Helmholtz 
had  no  scientific  right  to  say  either  good  or  bad  in 
the  matter  ;  but  let  me  waive  this  objection  for  a 
moment,  and  admit  Helmholtz's  artistic  right  to 
have  a  voice  in  the  discussion.  I  can  do  this  with 
all  the  better  grace  that  Music  is,  after  all,  an  art, 
and  Musical  Science  should  never  quite  lose  sight 
of  this  fact.  I  admit,  therefore,  that  the  tempered 
scale  is  bad  from  his  point  of  view.  But  here  lies 
the  whole  gist  of  the  question  ! 

Although  the  tempered  scale  does  not  admit  of 
the  formation  of  mathematically  exact  concords,  it 
does  admit  of  the  establishment  of  infinitely  more 
numerous  and  complex  organic  relations  between 
its  component  notes  than  are  possible  with  any 
scale  the  several  degrees  of  which  are  tuned  in  ex- 
act accordance  with  the  physical  law  of  overtones. 
And  the  dominant  tendency  of  the  growth  and  de- 
velopment of  the  musical  sense  in  Man,  for  many 
centuries,  has  been  in  the  direction  of  appreciating 
more  and  more  complex  and  manifold  relations  be- 
tween notes  of  different  pitch.    Helmholtz  says  the 


MUSIC   AND   SCIENCE  313 

modern  musical  ear  has  become  brutalized  by  long 
usage  in  hearing  inaccurate  intervals.  But  would 
it  not  be  at  least  as  reasonable  to  suppose  that 
Helmholtz's  ear,  by  long  working  at  the  most  deli- 
cate acoustical  experiments,  had  been  trained  to  a 
degree  of  sensitiveness  in  one  particular  direction 
such  as  should  properly  be  called  abnormal  and 
morbid  ?  And,  in  suggesting  this,  I  am  fully  aware 
that  the  by  no  means  impertinent  question  may  be 
asked  :  Can  the  musical  ear  possibly  be  too  deli- 
cately sensitive  to  accuracy  of  pitch  ?  In  one  sense, 
it  certainly  can  not ;  still  it  may  truly  be  said,  on 
the  other  hand,  that,  if  its  exceeding  delicacy  and 
sensitiveness  lead  it  to  reject  the  results  of  a  long 
and  continuous  process  of  evolution  in  the  art,  to 
wish  to  sacrifice  these  results  to  a  mathematical 
accuracy  of  interval  which  would  necessarily  stul- 
tify them,  its  keenness  in  this  particular  direction 
must  be  called  excessive  and  unmusical.  So  far 
from  being  brutalized,  the  modern  musical  ear  has 
been  gradually  educated  to  the  point  of  perceiving 
and  comprehending  musical  relations  so  complex 
and  far-reaching,  it  has  so  extended  the  field  of  its 
activity,  that  the  hair-splitting  musical  sense  of  the 
ancient  Greek,  with  all  its  nice  appreciation  of  in- 
finitesimal differences  of  pitch,  seems  merely  rudi- 
mentary in  comparison.  As  I  have  said,  the  whole 
©volution  of  the  musical  sense  in  Man— that  is,  in 


• 


314  MUSIC   AND   SCIENCE 

European  Man — during  many  centuries,  and,  with 
it,  the  evolution  of  the  whole  Art  of  Music  itself, 
has  almost  continuously  been  tending  away  from 
imputing  especial  importance  to  such  nice  distinc- 
tions, and  in  the  direction  of  establishing  more  and 
more  complex  and  far-reaching  relations  between 
all  the  notes  of  the  musical  system.  And  it  is  un- 
questionable that  the  tempered  scale,  and  it  alone, 
is  the  basis  of  a  musical  system  in  which  all  these 
far-reaching  relations  are  not  only  possible,  but 
rational.  Our  modern  tonal  system,  with  its  twelve 
keys,  or  tonalities,  forms  a  closed  circle,  starting  at 
any  point  on  the  circumference  of  which  you  can 
go  on  and  on,  and  at  last  find  yourself  back  again 
at  the  exact  point  of  departure  ;  every  one  of  these 
twelve  keys  stands  in  a  definite,  rational,  and  imme- 
diate relation  to  all  the  others.  And  this  is  pos- 
sible only  in  a  system  based  on  the  equally  tem- 
pered scale.  But,  after  all,  the  most  important 
point  in  the  whole  matter  is  that  our  present  tonal 
system  actually  is  based  on  the  tempered  scale  ; 
this  is  the  point  the  paramount  importance  of 
which  Helmholtz  seems  to  me  to  have  undervalued! 
In  other  words,  he  seems  to  have  ignored  the  mo- 
mentous significance  of  the  fact  that  the  establish- 
ment of  the  tempered  scale,  some  generations  ago, 
was  the  goal  toward  which  the  whole  evolution  of 
the  Art  of  Music  had  'oeen  steadily  tending  for  cen- 


MUSIC   AND   SCIENCE  315 

turies,  and  that  the  scale  itself  has  been  the  basis 
of  its  whole  further  development  since. 

Helmholtz's  physical  and  physiological  re- 
searches have,  in  many  instances,  led  him  far  on 
the  way  toward  a  satisfactory  explanation  of  certain 
established  musical  laws ;  but  in  this  case  I  can  not 
help  thinking  him  in  error,  in  not  recognizing  the 
equally  tempered  scale  as  a  musical  fact,  to  be 
scientifically  accounted  for  and  explained  as  such. 
He  seems  to  have  looked  upon  it  merely  as  the  em- 
bodiment of  a  musical  theory,  the  validity  of  which 
was  to  be  proved  or  disproved.  And  yet,  you  may 
say,  as  sound  is  the  material  of  which  Music  is 
made,  and  the  ear  the  organ  through  which  sound 
is  perceived,  how  can  it  be  possible  that  a  musical 
law  should,  even  in  the  slightest  degree,  contravene 
an  acoustical  law  ?  Must  not  the  laws  of  Music 
harmonize  with  those  of  Physiological  and  Physical 
Acoustics  ?  Indeed,  they  must  ! — just  as  much  as 
the  laws  of  Physiology  itself  must  harmonize  with 
those  of  Physics  ;  just  as  much,  but  no  more  !  I 
gladly  admit  that  certain  physical  phenomena,  and 
the  mechanism  of  the  human  ear  by  which  these 
phenomena  are  perceived  by  the  brain,  point  di- 
rectly to  the  general  scheme  of  our  musical  scale. 
It  is  also  quite  true  that  certain  physical  laws  point 
as  directly  to  the  general  scheme  of  the  structure 
of  the  cat.    Bilateral  symmetry  is  one  of  the  essen- 


316  MUSIC   AND   SCIENCE 

tial  principles  of  this  structure  ;  for,  in  the  cat's 
case,  bilateral  symmetry  means  vigour,  ease,  agility 
and  sureness  of  movement ;  lopsidedness  would  be 
a  defect,  for  it  is  through  vigour,  sureness,  and 
agility  of  movement  that  the  cat  is  able  to  catch  its 
prey  and  survive  in  the  general  struggle  for  exist- 
ence. The  cat's  hind  legs,  for  instance,  must  be 
of  the  same  length.  And  yet  we  find  that  all  that 
Nature  has  done  for  the  cat,  in  this  particular,  has 
been  to  make  her  two  hind  legs  nearly  enough  of 
the  same  length  for  all  practical  purposes  ;  you  can 
hardly  find  a  cat  in  the  world  whose  hind  legs  are 
mathematically  symmetrical.  I  have  already  said 
that  Nature  follows  physical  laws  with  a  certain 
genial  freedom  ;  Art  does  the  same.  As  soon  as 
any  competent  physiologist,  say  Professor  Huxley, 
admits  that  the  cat  is  a  failure  on  the  part  of  Na- 
ture, I  will  begin  to  think  about  admitting  that  the 
tempered  scale  is  a  failure  on  the  part  of  Music  ; 
but  not  till  then. 

I  have  brought  up  this  conclusion  of  Helmholtz's 
regarding  the  equally  tempered  scale  as  an  example 
of  the  danger  attending  any  attempt  to  make  even 
the  most  exact  observation  of,  and  reasoning  from, 
purely  acoustical  phenomena  the  basis  of  a  musical 
theory.  For  do  not  lose  sight  of  the  fact  that  do- 
ing this  is  really  tantamount  to  relinquishing  the 
inductive  method  of  scientific  research  for  the  old 


MUSIC   AND   SCIENCE  317 

deductive  one.  In  so  far  as  the  Science  of  Music 
rests  on  Acoustics,  and  this  on  Mathematics,  all 
scientific  research  that  proceeds  from  the  first  to 
the  second,  and  from  the  second  to  the  third, 
virtually  proceeds  inductively  from  the  special  to 
the  general,  from  the  concrete  to  the  abstract ;  but 
all  reasoning  that  proceeds  in  the  opposite  direction 
is  essentially  deductive,  and  hence  irreconcilable 
with  the  true  spirit  of  modern  Science.  And  it 
seems  to  me  that  Helmholtz  has  furnished  a  fine 
example  of  that  vice  I  have  pointed  out  in  the  de- 
ductive method,  that  of  tempting  those  who  employ 
it  to  "  conjugate  themselves  into  the  imperative 
mood  ; "  for  Helmholtz  has  allowed  himself  to  say 
good  and  had,  and  from  this  to  the  categorical  im- 
perative, "  Thou  shalt"  and  "  Thou  shalt  not,"  is 
but  a  short  step.  No  matter  how,  nor  on  what  data, 
a  musical  theory  may  be  built  up,  acoustical  tests 
are  insufficient  of  themselves  to  establish  its  vali- 
dity ;  it  may  stand  the  test  of  Physics  and  Physio- 
logy till  doomsday,  but  if  a  well-established  musical 
fact  is  at  any  time  found  to  run  counter  to  it,  woe 
to  your  theory  !  that  fact  has  it  on  the  hip  ! 

F.-J.  Fetis,  the  great  Belgian  musical  theorist, 
once  found  fault  with  a  certain  progression  in  one 
of  Beethoven's  symphonies,  on  the  ground  that  it 
contravened  musical  law.  Whether  the  story  told 
by  Berlioz  be  true,  or  not — of  Fetis's  "correct- 


318  MUSIC  AND  SCIENCE 

ing  *  the  passage  in  his  proposed  edition  of  Beetho- 
ven's symphonies,  and  he  (Berlioz)  making  such  a 
fuss  about  this  piece  of  "  Vandalism "  that  Fetis 
was  shamed  into  restoring  the  original  version — we 
certainly  know  that  subsequent  study  of  this  pas- 
sage led  Fetis  to  the  discovery  of  a  musical  law 
which  no  theorist  before  him  had  ever  been  able  to 
formulate.  Beethoven  was  right,  after  all  :  and 
Fetis's  chief  mistake  was  that  he  did  not  take  this 
for  granted  in  the  beginning.  For  Fetis  to  disap- 
prove of  a  progression  in  a  Beethoven  symphony 
was  very  like  what  Professor  Huxley  would  be 
guilty  of,  if  he  should  cry  out  to  Nature  :  "  Ho  ! 
stop  there  !  You  have  made  a  mistake  in  this 
horse  !  *  To  call  the  tempered  scale  bad,  after  Se- 
bastian Bach  had  called  it  good,  savours  of  much 
the  same  audacity.  For  the  man  of  science  both 
are  attempts  ultra  crepidam.  Yet  it  must  be 
granted  that  Fetis's  first  attitude  in  the  matter  was 
almost  the  universal  one  half  a  century  ago,  and  is 
by  no  means  uncommon  even  now  ;  and  how  many 
dogmatic  theorists  have  had  the  perspicacity  and 
moral  courage  to  recall  an  error,  and  learn  some- 
thing from  it,  as  he  did  ? 

It  is,  no  doubt,  absolutely  true  that  Music  is  not, 
properly  speaking,  a  natural  product,  that  its 
growth  and  development  have  not  been  the  result 
of  the  operation  of  what  are  commonly  called  the 


MUSIC   AND   SCIENCE  319 

Laws  of  Nature.  Neither  is  it,  like  Painting  or 
Sculpture,  the  representation  or  portrayal  of  any 
object  in  nature.  It  is  purely  a  product  of  the  hu- 
man— perhaps  originally  of  the  animal — brain  ;  it 
is  what  Man  has  made  it.  But  this  does  not  in  the 
least  contradict  the  fact  that  the  growth  and  deve- 
lopment of  the  Art  of  Music  have  been,  in  the  most 
exact  and  fullest  sense  of  the  term,  the  result  of  a 
process  of  evolution".  No  one  will  feel  inclined 
to  deny  that  Music  was  brought  into  being  to  sa- 
tisfy an  inborn  instinct  of  the  human  race.  This 
may  be  a  mere  supposition,  but  it  is  an  unavoid- 
able one  ;  it  is  moreover  borne  out  by  the  subse- 
quent history  of  the  art.  Almost  all  the  steps  for- 
ward the  Art  of  Music  has  taken  have  been  due  to 
the  instinct  of  musicians,  in  exceedingly  few  cases 
to  the  calculations  of  scientists.  And,  to  appreci- 
ate how  purely  instinctively  musicians  have  pushed 
the  art  forward,  we  must  remember  that — since 
Music  emerged  from  her  Silurian  Period,  and  espe- 
cially since  the  year  1600 — its  onward  steps  have 
been,  with  few  exceptions,  in  direct  contravention 
of  established  rules  and  supposed  laws. 

Now  and  then,  if,  upon  the  whole,  seldom,  a  man 
of  science  has  made  a  lucky  guess  that  really  led  to 
the  discovery  of  something.  Pythagoras  did  this, 
a  priori,  with  his  divisions  of  the  monochord  ;  he 
introduced  the  elements  of  order  into  a  musical 


320  MUSIC   AND   SCIENCE 

system  so  chaotic  as  hardly  to  deserve  the  name* 
And  yet  see  how  exceedingly  little  that  was  per- 
manent we  owe  to  Pythagoras's  experiments  !  To 
his  speculations  we  owe  next  to  nothing  !  He  did 
happen  —  and  in  harmony  with  a  law  which  he 
certainly  never  in  the  least  suspected,  the  law  of 
overtones — to  hit  right,  when  he  established  the 
intervals  of  the  perfect  octave,  and  the  perfect  5th 
and  4th  ;  his  getting  the  "  tonos"  or  tone,  by  sub- 
tracting the  one  from  the  other  was  also  a  tolerably 
lucky  venture.  But  his  subdivision  of  the  tetra- 
chord  has  been  proved  to  be  all  wrong,  irrational, 
and  unmusical.  Moreover  the  whole  modal  system 
that  was  based  on  his  subdivision  of  the  tetrachord 
and  the  complicated  inversions  of  tetrachord  and 
pentachord,  and  survived — with  various  modifica- 
tions in  detail,  introduced  by  St.  Ambrose  and 
Gregory  the  Great — well  into  the  seventeenth  cen- 
tury, when  it  was  overthrown  by  the  tonal  system 
— this  whole  modal  system  is  now  seen  to  have 
been  essentially  artificial,  the  outgrowth  of  mere 
mathematical  speculation  and  a  priori  settling 
what  ought  to  he,  without  regard  for  musical  facts. 
Not  one  of  the  old  Greek,  Ambrosian,  or  Gregorian 
modal  scales  had  any  inherent  raison  d'etre  ;  none 
of  them  sprang  from  an  interior  musical  necessity. 
They  were  purely  conventional.  It  is  only  the 
modern  tonal  scales,  with  the  struggling  asunder 


MUSIC   AND  SCIENCE  321 

of  their  fourth,  and  seventh  degrees,  and  their  lead- 
ing -  note  striving  toward  the  tonic,  that  are  firm- 
ly rooted  in  the  very  nature  of  Music.  Note,  too, 
how  the  old  modes,  being  merely  conventional, 
brought  with  them  the  necessity  of  all  music  writ- 
ten in  them  being  bound  around  and  hampered  by 
the  strictest  and  most  nearly  countless  conventio- 
nal rules  known  in  the  history  of  the  art.  Think  of 
the  number  and  inexorable  strictness  of  the  rules 
of  the  old  vocal  simple  counterpoint  of  the  fif- 
teenth and  sixteenth  centuries  !  Yet  the  intelli- 
gently profound  student  of  harmony  to-day  sees 
clearly  enough  that  these  rules  were,  for  the  most 
part,  necessary ;  polyphonic  writing  in  the  modal 
system  could  not  have  got  on  without  them  ;  mo- 
dal harmony  would  have  ceased  to  be  modal  har- 
mony by  disobeying  them.  An  unprepared  disso- 
nance, for  instance,  is  musically  inconceivable — M. 
Bourgault  -  Ducoudray  to  the  contrary  notwith- 
standing— when  unexplained  to  the  ear  by  the 
sense  of  tonality.  Monteverde's  free  use  of  the 
dominant  7th  was  the  death-knell  of  the  whole 
modal  system  ;  with  it  tonal  harmony  was  born, 
and  Music  developed  a  spinal  column  and  became 
vertebrate.  And  Monteverde's  use  of  the  chord  of 
the  dominant  7th — no  one  had  ever  heard  of  a 
chord  of  the  7th  before  ! — was  simply  and  solely  in 
obedience  to  his  musical  instinct ;  he  did  what  was 
21 


322  MUSIC   AND   SCIENCE 

tabooed  by  every  theorist  of  his  day,  his  innovation 
was  condemned  and  ridiculed  ;  but  it  had  that  in 
it  that  gave  the  Art  of  Music  the  most  puissant  on- 
ward push  it  had  known  since  old  Hucbald  first 
tried  his  two-voice  organum  in  5ths. 

The  fact  that  the  evolution  of  Music  has  found 
its  motive  force  in  Man,  and  not  in  Nature,  does 
not,  it  seems  to  me,  in  the  least  invalidate  the 
methods  of  scientific  musical  research  I  have  advo- 
cated. Substitute  the  Human  Mind  for  Nature, 
and  you  have  a  Science  of  Music  that  is,  in  every 
other  respect,  exactly  similar  to  the  so-called  natu- 
ral sciences.  Eemember  also  that,  if  teleological 
considerations  are  to  be  admitted  at  all,  one  of  the 
objects  that  can  be  rationally  attributed  to  Music, 
as  an  independent  art,  is  the  satisfaction  of  the 
specific  musical  sense  in  Man.  But,  as  all  teleo- 
logy is  largely  speculative,  this  domain  should  be 
entered  upon  only  with  the  greatest  caution.  In- 
ductive Musical  Science  has  not  primarily  to  do 
with  Mathematics,  Physics,  Physiology,  nor  Psy- 
chology ;  it  must,  it  is  true,  often  have  recourse  to 
these,  but  it  has  primarily  to  do  with  Music  itself, 
with  the  analytic  and  comparative  study  of  the 
rich  store  of  actual  music  that  has  been  handed 
down  from  age  to  age.  And,  in  its  search  for  mu- 
sical law,  it  must  scrutinize  this  music,  not  with  the 
smile  or  frown  of  dogmatic  criticism,  but  with  the 


MUSIC   AND   SCIENCE  323 

keen  eye  of  dispassionate  investigation.  There 
should  be  no  question  of  what  Music  ought,  or 
ought  not,  to  be  ;  the  only  questions  that  interest 
the  Science  of  Music  are  what  Music  is  and  has 
been,  and  how  and  why  it  has  become  what  it  is. 

Although  the  only  essential  difference  between 
musical  evolution  and  the  evolution  of  natural  or- 
ganic forms  is  that  Nature  herself  plays  the  part 
in  the  one  that  the  Human  Mind  does  in  the  other, 
this  difference  must  none  the  less  be  recognized  as 
of  great  importance,  and  should  never  be  lost  sight 
of.  No  scientific  theory  has  ever  had  any  influ- 
ence upon  the  course  of  Nature.  The  solar  system 
never  cared  a  whit  for  Kepler  nor  Newton,  any 
more  than  it  did  for  the  older  astronomers,  who 
made  the  earth  the  centre  of  everything.  The 
earth  did  not  move  to  please  Galileo,  neither  did  it 
stop  to  please  Aristotle.  It  never  entered  Nature's 
heap  to  abhor  a  vacuum  because  men  said  she  did, 
and  we  all  have  seen  how  she  has  more  than  once 
obstinately  refused  to  make  an  earthquake  to  order 
for  Mr.  Wiggin.  Read  the  laws  of  Nature  aright, 
or  read  them  wrong,  natural  phenomena  will  be 
produced  in  accordance  with  the  law,  not  with 
your  interpretation  thereof.  But  with  Music  the 
case  is  somewhat  different.  Composers,  the  pro- 
ducers of  Music,  have  not  invariably  been  quite 


324  MUSIC   AND   SCIENCE 

so  deaf  to  scientific  theory  as  Nature  is  ;  they  have 
not  always  worked  in  absolute  harmony  with  musi- 
cal law,  but  have  at  times  been,  to  a  greater  or  less 
extent,  biassed  by  false  expositions  of  the  same. 
Much  music  has  been  written  in  accordance  with 
what  were  once  deemed  eternal  and  unalterable 
laws  of  the  art,  but  have  since  been  found  to  be  no 
better  than  mere  rules,  based  on  ungrounded  hy- 
potheses, or  on  faulty  or  incomplete  theories.  This 
reaction  of  musical  theory  upon  Music  itself  has 
probably  exerted  no  very  sensible  influence  upon 
the  real  evolution  of  the  art,  save  perhaps  in  the 
way  of  retarding  it,  and  making  it  more  gradual 
than  it  might  otherwise  have  been  ;  yet  this  reac- 
tion of  theory  upon  musical  practice,  this  influence 
of  the  theorist  over  the  composer,  does  introduce  a 
disturbing  element  into  the  scientific  study  of  mu- 
sical evolution,  an  element  which  must  carefully 
be  eliminated  before  the  true  laws  of  the  art  can  be 
read  aright. 

In  studying  the  art  by  the  light  of  historic  docu- 
ments, it  is  of  prime  importance  to  scrutinize 
with  the  greatest  care  all  elements  of  change  we 
may  find  in  it  from  time  to  time.  The  appear- 
ance of  an  unprecedented  phenomenon  should  al- 
ways put  us  on  our  guard.  No  matter  of  what 
nature  this  phenomenon  may  seem  to  be,  at  first 
sight,  we  must  be  careful  to  see  exactly  what  influ- 


MUSIC  AND  SCIENCE  325 

ence  it  exerted  upon  the  subsequent  development 
of  the  art ;  whether  it  was  really  of  the  nature  of 
a  " variation n  ("accidental"  or  otherwise)  that 
represented  the  first  tentative  step  of  a  new  phase 
of  evolution,  leading  to  developments  of  permanent 
value,  or  merely  an  ephemeral  ignis  fatuus  flash 
that  led  only  to  a  no-thoroughfare.  This  caution 
should  be  exercised  equally,  whether  we  read  the 
history  of  Music  forwards  or  backwards,  whether 
we  try  to  trace  back  the  pedigree  of  a  present  mu- 
sical form,  or  start  with  an  old  development  and 
study  its  influence  upon  what  came  after  it.  And 
I  hardly  need  say  that  exceedingly  little  weight  is, 
as  a  rule,  to  be  attributed  to  contemporary  com- 
ment on,  or  explanation  of,  new  steps  in  musical 
evolution,  or  even  to  what  was  thought  of  them  at 
the  time  by  their  originators  themselves.  For,  as 
I  have  already  said,  such  progressive  steps  were  al- 
most always  taken  instinctively  by  composers,  and 
not  in  consequence  of  any  clear  foresight  or  precal- 
culative  process  of  reasoning  on  their  part.  In- 
deed such  innovators  hardly  ever  appreciated  the 
full  value  of  their  inventions  ;  and,  as  for  contem- 
porary theorists,  they  were  the  last  to  impute  any 
value  to  them  at  all.  A  composer  would  make  a 
new  combination,  a  new  progression,  because  his 
ear  told  him  it  was  good,  even  though,  as  was  ge- 
nerally the  case,  it  ran  counter  to  the  most  esteemed 


L 


I 


326  MUSIC   AND   SCIENCE 

musical  theories  of  his  day ;  and,  likely  enough, 
the  composer  himself  would  have  been  only  one  jot 
less  surprised  than  his  most  scandalized  critics, 
could  he  but  have  been  told  that  this  new  combi- 
nation, or  progression,  of  his,  far  from  being  a  piece 
of  lawlessness,  was  really  in  perfect  harmony  with 
musical  law.  He  had  not  discovered  a  new  law, 
although  he  had  unconsciously  applied  it ;  what  he 
had  done  was  to  perceive  for  the  first  time  a  new 
musical  fact.  Thus  practice  has,  in  Music,  almost 
invariably  led  the  way  for  theory ;  the  perception 
of  facts  has  preceded  the  recognition  of  principles. 
This  leads  me  to  one  of  the  most  important 
points  in  musical  evolution  :  the  gradual  evolution 
of  what  may  be  called  the  specific  musical  sense  in 
Man.  By  this  I  mean  the  intuitive  or  acquired 
power  of  perceiving,  through  the  ear,  the  manifold 
relations  existing  between  notes  of  different  pitch, 
either  depending  on,  or  independent  of,  certain 
rhythmic  conditions ;  relations  of  melody  or  har- 
mony, of  consonance  or  dissonance,  of  mutual  at- 
traction or  repulsion,  of  tonality  or  modality. 
That  these  relations  between  notes  of  different 
pitch  are  eternal,  and  governed  by  immutable  laws, 
seems  to  me  unquestionable  ;  though  I  must  once 
more  caution  the  reader  not  to  forget  the  distinc- 
tion to  be  drawn  between  an  actual  law  and  the 
mere  theoretic  exposition  thereof.     It  seems  to  me 


MUSIC   AND  SCIENCE  327 

more  than  probable — though  I  leave  the  final  solu- 
tion of  this  problem  to  others  more  competent 
than  I — that  the  first  perception  of  a  new  musical 
fact  by  a  composer  has  often  been,  in  one  way  at 
least,  of  a  fundamentally  different  nature  from  the 
first  recognition,  or  suspicion,  of  a  hitherto  un- 
known physical  principle  by  a  man  of  science ; 
that  the  first  perception  of  a  new  musical  fact 
often  implies  a  new  development  in  the  musical 
sense  of  the  composer  himself. 

Take,  for  example,  Monte verde's  so-called  "  dis- 
covery" of  the  chord  of  the  dominant  7th,  as  a  free 
discord.  We  now  know,  though  Monteverde  very 
likely  did  not,  that  the  musical  phenomenon  he 
was  the  first  to  perceive  (if  current  musical  history 
is  to  be  trusted),  and  on  the  perception  of  which 
he  instinctively,  and  doubtless  unconsciously, 
based  his  use  of  the  dominant  7th  as  an  unprepared 
dissonance,  was  what  I  would  call  the  inherent 
magnetic  character  of  the  tritone,  the  mutual  at- 
traction and  repulsion  between  the  fourth  degree 
and  leading-note  of  the  tonal  scale.  Now,  it  might 
be  urged  that  the  discovery  of  the  magnetic  cha- 
racter of  the  tritone  no  more  necessarily  implied 
that  Monteverde's  specific  musical  sense  was  more 
highly  developed  than  that  of  his  predecessors, 
than  Newton's  noticing  the  falling  apple  implied 
that  his  brain  had  suddenly  undergone  a  new  pro- 


328  MUSIC   AND   SCIENCE 

cess  of  evolution.  But  the  two  cases  are  quite 
different.  Newton  observed  no  new  phenomenon  ; 
people  had  seen  apples  fall  before,  time  out  of 
mind.  What  he  did  do  that  was  new,  was  to  take 
a  hint  from  a  perfectly  familiar  phenomenon, 
which  led  him  to  the  discovery  of  the  law  which 
governed  it.  Monteverde,  on  the  other  hand,  dis- 
covered no  law  at  all ;  he  did  not  find  out  why  the 
tritone  was  magnetic,  neither  had  he  an  inkling  of 
a  tithe  of  the  numerous  musical  affinities  which 
were  destined  one  day  to  be  recognized  as  resulting 
from  this  magnetism.  He  simply  perceived  for 
the  first  time  that  the  tritone  was  magnetic  ;  and 
this  perception  could  come  to  him  only  through 
his  musical  sense.  I  call  this,  perhaps,  not  a  con- 
clusive proof,  but  at  least  a  strong  indication,  of 
an  actual  enlargement,  new  development,  step  for- 
wards in  evolution  —  call  it  what  you  will  —  of 
Monteverde's  musical  sense ;  for  to  perceive  the 
magnetic  character  of  the  tritone  is  exactly  like 
perceiving  that  fire  is  hot.  The  tritone  itself  was 
no  novelty  in  music  ;  it  had  been  made  the  subject 
of  infinite  speculation  and  no  little  experimentali- 
zing long  before  Monteverde's  day ;  theorists  had 
stigmatized  it  as  the  Didbolus  in  Musica,  and  not 
entirely  without  reason,  for  its  magnetic  quality  is 
all  that  cures  it  of  its  "  devilishness,"  and  this 
magnetic  quality  is  just  what  they  had  not  been 


MUSIC   AND   SCIENCE  329 

able  to  perceive.  If  people  had  gone  on  using  fire 
for  centuries,  without  noticing  that  it  was  hot,  and 
somebody  suddenly  appeared  who  did  perceive  its 
heat,  I  should  say  that  it  looked  very  like  a  new 
step  forward  in  the  evolution  of  the  sense  for  heat 
and  cold  in  that  person.  And,  until  Monteverde, 
people  had  gone  on  thinking  there  was  no  magnetism 
in  the  tritone,  although  the  magnetic  character  of 
some  other  intervals  had  long  been  recognized. 

That  the  gradual  evolution  of  Man's  specific 
musical  sense  has  been  inextricably  interwoven, 
both  in  action  and  reaction,  with  the  evolution  of 
the  Art  of  Music  itself  may  be  taken  for  granted. 
And  to  discover  just  how  far,  and  in  what  manner 
the  one  has  been  conditioned  by  the  other  is  at 
once  one  of  the  most  interesting  and  difficult  tasks 
the  Science  of  Music  has  to  impose  upon  itself.  I 
have  said  that  substituting  the  Human  Mind  for 
Nature,  as  the  chief  motive  force  in  musical  evolu- 
tion, introduces  a  certain  element  of  difficulty  into 
scientific  musical  research.  This  difficulty  is  not 
lessened  by  the  fact  that  it  was  long  before  Music 
was,  either  speculatively  or  practically,  recognized 
as  an  independent  art,  and  by  the  enormous  influ- 
ence the  sister  arts  of  Poetry  and  the  Drama  have 
often  exerted  upon  its  development.  One  of  the 
most  perplexing  problems  for  the  musical  scientist 
to  solve  is:  How  far  has  the  evolution  of  music  been 


330  MUSIC    AND   SCIENCE 

conditioned  by  forces  inherent  in  its  own  nature, 
and  how  far  by  the  outside  influence  of  Poetry  and 
the  Drama?  In  other  words,  positing  the  human 
Mind  as  the  main-spring  of  musical  evolution,  how 
far  has  Man  conditioned  this  evolution  to  satisfy 
purely  aesthetic  cravings,  on  the  one  hand,  and 
emotional  demands,  on  the  other? 

Critical,  that  is  to  say,  inductive  Philosophy,  as 
represented  by  Schopenhauer  and  Wagner,  and  in- 
ductive Science,  as  represented  by  Darwin,  agree 
on  one  point :  that  the  primordial  musical  monad 
is  the  cry  of  pleasure,  pain,  or  passion  given  forth 
by  such  animals  as  are  possessed  of  vocal  organs,  or 
by  Man  himself.  Thus  the  original  germ  of  Music 
is  the  instinctive  and  impulsive  expression  of 
emotion  through  the  medium  of  sound.  Darwin 
found  reason  for  believing  that  the  first  step  in  the 
evolution  of  this  ' ' primordial  cry  "  into  music  was 
made,  not  by  Man,  but  by  humbler  members  of 
the  animal  kingdom ;  that  especially  the  cry  of 
the  male  animal  during  the  season  of  courtship  was 
not  merely  an  impulsive,  involuntary  vocal  expres- 
sion of  emotion — like  the  sudden  cry  of  pain  called 
forth  by  a  bodily  wound — but  largely  a  voluntary 
expression,  with  the  conscious  purpose  of  exciting 
a  corresponding  emotion  in  the  female  listener. 
Nay,  more  than  this  ;  for,  as  "  the  female  canary 
always  chooses  the  best  singer,  and,  in  a  state  of 


MUSIC   AND  SCIENCE  331 

nature,  the  female  finch  selects  that  male  out  of  a 
hundred  whose  note  pleases  her  most,"  it  seems 
quite  likely  that  the  cries  of  some  animals,  especi- 
ally of  some  birds,  during  courtship  are  not  only 
given  forth  with  the  direct  intent  of  exciting  emo- 
tion, but  are  voluntarily  modified  for  the  purpose 
of  giving  pleasure  to  the  listener.  The  rivalry  be- 
tween male  birds  in  singing,  each  one  doing  his 
best  to  outsing  his  competitors,  is  well  known,  and 
seems  to  point  directly  to  the  conclusion  that 
actual  beauty  of  tone  is  consciously  aimed  at. 
When  we  come  to  Man,  this  rudimentary  modifica- 
tion of  the  u  primordial  cry  n  becomes  vastly  more 
marked ;  the  cry  gains  definiteness  and  variety  of 
pitch  and  distinctness  of  rhythmic  character,  and 
is  soon  to  be  recognized  as  a  rude  sort  of  music. 

That  the  desire  to  render  sound  pleasurable  was 
really  the  prime  motive  force  which  conditioned 
the  evolution  of  the  "  primordial  cry  "  into  music, 
is  a  conclusion  that  seems  to  me  unavoidable. 
For,  had  the  "primordial  cry"  contained  within 
itself  the  whole  potency  and  power  of  musical  de- 
velopment, had  the  motive  force  which  gave  its 
evolution  a  musical  direction  been  purely  emo- 
tional, it  would  seem  as  if,  the  higher  we  mount 
in  the  scale  of  musical  forms,  the  more  vivid,  in- 
tense, and  convincing  must  be  their  power  of  ex- 
pressing emotion.     But  this  is  known  not  to  be 


332  MUSIC   AND   SCIENCE 

the  case.  No  music  ever  written  can  vie  with  the 
"primordial  cry"  itself,  as  an  intense  and  vivid 
expression  of  emotion.  The  motive  force  which 
has  brought  about  the  gradual  evolution  of  musical 
forms  seems,  on  the  contrary,  to  have  been  by  no 
means  purely  emotional,  but  chiefly  aesthetic  in  its 
nature.  As  far  as  I  see,  we  can  not  escape  the 
conclusion  that  it  is  to  Man's  aesthetic  sense,  his 
sense  for  beauty,  that  we  chiefly,  if  not  wholly, 
owe  the  musical  evolution  of  the  primordial  monad 
we  found  to  be  rooted  in  emotion. 

Mysterious  in  its  prime  essence  as  is  the  pleasure 
we  derive  from  the  perception  of  that  equally  mys- 
terious something  we  call  Beauty,  the  so-called 
aesthetic  sense,  through  which  our  perceptions  of 
beauty  are  obtained,  is  to  a  certain  extent  capable 
of  analysis.  Our  perceptions  of  beauty  are  nor- 
mally conveyed  to  us  through  one  or  the  other  of 
the  two  higher  senses — the  sense  of  sight  or  the 
sense  of  hearing.1  The  perceptions  of  beauty  we 
obtain  through  these  two  senses  are  twofold ;  the 
one  sort  is  purely  sensual,  the  pleasure  we  derive 
from  it  being  solely  conditioned  by  special  modes 
or  degrees  of  nervous  irritation.     This  category 

1  It  would  take  me  too  long  to  recapitulate  here  all  the  argument* 
which  tend  to  prove  that  Sight  and  Hearing  are  the  only  (esthetic  senses, 
properly  so  called.  These  arguments  are  to  be  found  set  forth  at  great 
length,  and  with  abundant  wealth  of  illustration,  in  the  first  chapter  of 
Edmund  Gurney's  The  Power  of  Sound. 


MUSIC   AND   SCIENCE  333 

comprises  the  perception  of  colour  through  the  eye, 
and  the  perception  of  quality  of  sound  (clang-tint) 
and  dynamic  intensity  of  sound  (loudness  or  soft- 
ness) through  the  ear.  The  other  sort  is  intel- 
lectual, the  pleasure  we  derive  from  it  depending 
on  our  perception  of  the  relation  between  the 
several  component  parts  of  an  object,  and  of  each 
and  all  of  these  parts  to  the  whole.  In  this  category 
falls  the  perception  of  visual  or  musical  form. 
The  prime  factors  of  musical  form  are  relations  of 
pitch  (either  simultaneous  or  consecutive)  and  re- 
lations of  time  (Rhythm). 

Now,  even  the  first  steps  in  the  evolution  of  the 
"primordial  cry"  into  music  were  modifications 
tending,  not  toward  imparting  to  it  more  intense 
emotional  expressiveness,  but  toward  giving  it 
beauty  of  clang-tint,  that  it  might  appeal  not  only 
to  the  responsive  emotions  of  the  listener,  but  also 
to  her  sense  for  beauty  ;  and  what  subsequent  for- 
mal modifications  the  "  cry  *  underwent,  tending 
to  give  it  something  in  the  way  of  musical  orga- 
nism, must  have  had  the  same  end  in  view,  namely 
to  satisfy  the  aesthetic  sense.  And  just  here  is 
where  that  particular  phase  of  the  aesthetic  sense 
which  I  have  called  the  specific  musical  sense  in 
Man  came  into  play. 

The  evolution  of  this  sense  in  Man  seems  to 
have  gone  forward  even  more   slowly    than    the 


334 


MUSIC   AND  SCIENCE 


evolution  of  the  Art  of  Music  itself ;  its  full  de- 
velopment— if  we  can  rightly  call  it  fully  deve- 
loped even  now — is  quite  recent.  The  following 
passage  in  Schumann's  B-flat  variations  for  two 
pianofortes  : — 


Andante. 


which  sounds  so  beautiful  to  our  modern  ear, 
would,  beyond  a  doubt,  have  been  utterly  inex- 
plicable and  hideous  to  Palestrina's  perception ; 
whereas  this  progression  : — 


p 


3g= 


of  which  countless  examples  are  to  be  found  in 
Palestrina,  strikes  us  as  being  not  entirely  a  thing 
of  beauty.  And  note,  by  the  way,  that  the  Schu- 
mann passage  which  sounds  so  sweet  to  us  contains 
some  exceedingly  harsh  dissonances,  while  the 
ugly  Palestrina  progression  runs  on  mere  con- 
cords !    How  is  it  that  Palestrina  and  we  agree  so 


MUSIC   AND   SCIENCE  335 

ill  ?  Simply  that  our  musical  sense  has  grown  to 
the  perception  of  relations,  of  which  Palestrina, 
way  back  there  in  the  sixteenth  century,  had  not 
the  faintest  inkling.  In  that  little  passage  Schu- 
mann brings  into  play  a  musical  principle,  of  the 
value,  of  the  very  nature,  of  which  Palestrina  had 
no  more  notion  than  a  Digger  Indian  has  of  the 
subjunctive  mood.  Schumann's  harsh  dissonances 
are  explained  and  accounted  for  to  our  ear  by  our 
sense  of  tonality,  a  sense  of  which  Palestrina 
could  have  had  no  more  than  a  vague  premonitory 
suspicion,  if  he  had  that ;  and  Palestrina's  pro- 
gression seems  harsh  and  ugly  to  us,  simply  be- 
cause it  runs  on  two  entirely  unrelated  chords, 
and  hence  offends  our  sense  of  tonality.  Pales- 
trina found  nothing  ugly  in  it,  because  he  had  no 
sense  of  tonality  to  offend  !  His  specific  musical 
sense  was  at  a  lower  stage  of  evolution  than  ourSo 

In  like  manner  the  evolution  of  musical  forms, 
of  the  Art  of  Music  itself,  the  record  of  which 
is  nothing  but  the  history  of  music,  has  passed 
through  various,  more  or  less  sharply  defined, 
successive  stages.  The  picture  it  presents  to  the 
scientific  student  is  singularly  like  that  shown  by 
evolution  in  the  animal  kingdom  ;  there  is  no 
single  one  of  the  higher  forms  of  modern  Music, 
the  pedigree  of  which  can  not  be  traced  back  to 
older,  simpler  forms.     And,  as  in  the  animal  king- 


336  MUSIC   AND   SCIENCE 

dom,  so  also  in  Music,  some  of  the  oldest  and  sim- 
plest organisms  have  exhibited  a  power  of  survival 
amid  the  general  struggle  for  existence  that  has  en- 
abled them  to  thrive,  side  by  side  with  their  more 
highly  organized  and  complex  descendants;  while 
in  every  case  all  the  successive  stages  in  the  evolu- 
tion of  the  latter  lie  as  plainly  before  us  as  Pro- 
fessor Huxley's  five  stages  in  the  evolution  of  the 
horse.  There  are  no  "  missing  links n  to  be  sup- 
plied by  calculation  nor  conjecture.  And  it  may 
be  said,  without  speaking  too  tropically,  that  in 
musical  evolution — always  substituting  the  Human 
Mind  for  Nature — the  ' '  struggle  for  life  "  has  gone 
on  under,  and  been  influenced  and  guided  by,  con- 
ditions very  similar  to  those  found  in  the  history  of 
all  organic  evolution :  accidental  variation,  habi- 
tat, and  heredity. 

Although  the  modification  of  old  musical  forms, 
and  the  production  of  new  ones,  have  by  no  means 
been  invariably  preceded  by  a  recognizable  onward 
step  in  the  evolution  of  Man's  musical  sense,  that 
is,  by  a  perception  of  a  hitherto  unknown  musical 
fact  on  the  part  of  composers,  the  history  of  the 
art  shows  that  no  advance  has  ever  been  made  by 
Man's  musical  sense  without  being  soon  followed 
by  a  corresponding  modification  of  old  forms  and 
development  of  new  ones.  It  seems  safe  to  con- 
clude that,  of  all  conditions  favourable  to  the  ap- 


MUSIC   AND   SCIENCE  337 

parition  of  new  forms,  the  most  favourable  is  that 
brought  about  by  an  onward  step  in  the  evolution 
of  the  musical  sense  in  Man. 

But,  side  by  side  with  this  sense,  we  find  that 
another  force  of  a  very  different  nature  has  been  at 
work,  the  activity  of  which  is  also  productive  of 
conditions  favourable  to  the  development  of  new 
forms.  This  force  is  the  instinctive  tendency  of 
Man  to  recognize  Music  as  a  vehicle  for  emotional 
expression.  Indeed  these  two  forces,  the  one 
emotional  and  the  other  aesthetic,  seem  generally 
to  have  worked  together,  mutually  controlling  and 
counterbalancing  each  other.  Yet  there  have  been 
periods  in  the  history  of  the  art  when  one  or  the 
other  of  these  forces  has  manifestly  got  the  upper 
hand.  There  have  been  periods,  for  instance, 
when  Music  seemed  almost  wholly  to  forget  that 
emotional  yearning  from  which  it  was  first  born, 
and  to  cling  solely  to  its  purely  aesthetic  purpose. 
That  Music,  in  so  doing,  could  really  satisfy  Man's 
demands  upon  it  for  any  considerable  time  might 
seem  strange  and  unaccountable ;  one  might  won- 
der at  music-loving  and  music-producing  Mankind 
long  deriving  such  pleasure  from  the  mere  per- 
ception of  musical  form,  and  finding  the  satisfac- 
tion of  its  sense  for  beauty  so  engrossing,  as  to  be 
content  to  devote  all  its  energies  to  the  develop- 
ment and  perfection  of  the  plastic  side  of  Music, 


338  MUSIC   AND   SCIENCE 

to  giving  it  as  high  an  organism  as  possible,  with 
little  or  no  care  for  its  capacity  for  emotional  ex- 
pression, were  it  not  for  one  consideration.  This  is 
the  essentially  emotional  character  of  our  percep- 
tion of  Beauty  per  se.  We  all  have  heard  of,  and 
doubtless  many  of  us  have  experienced,  the  heart- 
beating  caused  by  seeing  that  serenest  of  statues, 
the  Venus  of  Milo  ;  and  it  is  quite  conceivable  that 
musicians  should  long  find  the  emotional  demands 
of  their  nature  amply  satisfied  by  sheer  musical 
beauty,  without  craving  any  more  specific  emo- 
tional expressiveness  in  Music  that  is  implied  in 
the  very  fact  of  its  being  beautiful.  Thus  we  have 
seen  musical  forms  spring  up  and  continue  to  de- 
velop and  acquire  a  more  and  more  highly  orga- 
nized structure,  in  obedience  to  the  dictates  of  the 
purely  aesthetic  sense  in  Man,  up  to  the  point 
where  all  the  organic  principles  apprehensible  by 
his  specific  musical  sense  were  exhausted,  and  no 
further  evolution  seemed  possible.  At  such  times 
the  development  of  the  art  comes  to  a  stand-still ; 
the  evolution  stops  until  Man's  musical  sense  itself 
develops  some  new  faculty,  which  enables  it  to 
perceive,  or  apply,  a  hitherto  unsuspected  organic 
principle.  Such  a  new  principle  once  discovered, 
or,  may  be,  only  blindly  applied,  the  evolution  of 
the  art  sets  out  afresh;  old  forms  are  modified 
and  new  ones  produced  and  perfected,  until  the 


MUSIC   AND   SCIENCE  339 

new  principle  is  in  its  turn  exhausted,  and  another 
period  of  stagnation  sets  in. 

But  it  must  be  remembered  that  the  evolution  of 
the  specific  musical  sense  in  Man  seems  to  be  en- 
tirely an  automatic  process  ;  that  is  to  say,  its  effi- 
cient causes  lie  wholly  hidden  from  us.  Man  can 
not  at  will  force  this  sense  of  his  to  take  a  new  step 
forward,  but  has  to  wait  for  it  to  take  the  step 
when  it  can.  Indeed  any  new  development  of  his 
musical  sense  is  the  very  last  thing  Man  expects 
or  thinks  of  ;  it  is  even  unimaginable  by  him,  until 
it  has  actually  taken  place.  The  sense  for  tonality, 
for  instance,  must  have  been  as  inconceivable  to  the 
ancient  Greek  as  the  power  of  sight  is  to  a  man 
congenitally  blind.  So,  when  Music  reaches  a 
point  where  all  existing  organic  forms  have  been 
worked  out,  and  the  possibilities  of  plastic  evolu- 
tion seem  exhausted,  it  is  absolutely  idle  for  Man 
to  look  for  a  sudden  development  of  his  musical 
sense  to  produce  new  possibilities  ;  for  this  new 
development  will  not  come  at  his  bidding,  he  has 
no  means  of  knowing  when  nor  how  it  will  come, 
nor  even  whether  it  be  destined  to  come  at  all. 
None  of  us  knows  whether  he  has  got  to  the  end  of 
his  tether  in  this  respect,  or  not  !  Have  all  the 
possible  relations  and  affinities  between  notes  of 
different  pitch  been  apprehended  by  the  human 
ear  ?    It  seems  to  us  as  if  they  had  ;  but  who 


340  MUSIC   AND   SCIENCE 

shall  say  ?  Surely  Palestrina  thought  his  musi- 
cal sense  as  complete  as  his  sense  of  hearing  ; 
but  succeeding  ages  have  proved  his  mistake,  and, 
for  aught  we  know,  we  may  be  as  much  in  error  as 
he. 

What  musicians,  the  producers  of  music,  actu- 
ally have  done,  in  times  when  all  existing  musical 
forms  were  exhausted,  and  all  further  evolution 
seemed  hopeless,  is  this  :  instead  of  seeking  to 
evolve  still  more  highly  organized  forms  from  the 
old,  effete  types,  they  have,  as  a  rule,  turned  their 
attention  quite  away  from  this  matter,  and  concen- 
trated their  energy  upon  imparting  to  the  art  a 
more  highly  potentized  emotional  expressive  power, 
seeking  to  connect  Music  more  immediately  than 
before  with  Man's  psychical  experience,  and  make 
it  strike  roots  deeper  and  deeper  into  human  life, 
emotion,  and  passion.  It  is  at  such  periods  that,  as 
Wagner  has  said,  Music  once  more  becomes  mind- 
ful of  her  first  estate,  and  the  "  primordial  cry  * 
again  rings  through  the  aisles  and  reverberates 
from  the  dome  of  her  temple.  For  it  is  especially 
noteworthy  that  such  fresh  attempts  to  make 
Music  the  vehicle  for  emotional  expression  are  at 
first  accompanied  by  a  return  to  musical  forms  of 
such  low  organism  that,  compared  to  the  highly 
developed  and  complex  forms  they  seek  to  displace, 
they  seem  almost  protoplastic.     Such  times  are  re- 


MUSIC   AND   SCIENCE  341 

volutionary  and  seemingly  anarchic  ;  the  whilom 
supremacy  of  Man's  aesthetic  sense  is  over  (for  a 
while),  and  his  demand  for  emotional  expressive- 
ness rules  the  hour.  Such  sudden  incursions  of 
highly  expressive,  but  almost  primordial,  forms 
into  the  domain  of  Music  have  at  times  proved  ex- 
ceedingly dangerous,  if  not  absolutely  fatal,  to  the 
survival  of  all  hitherto  recognized  forms  of  higher 
organism.  It  is  hard  for  the  weary  old  complex 
forms  to  hold  their  own  against  the  inroads  of 
these  Silurian  mollusks  ;  and  the  rapidity  with 
which  the  latter  have  exterminated  the  former,  by 
virtue  of  their  superior  expressive  power,  seems  a 
pretty  good  proof  that,  although  a  more  or  less 
highly  organized  form  is  indispensable  for  Music 
fully  to  satisfy  Man's  aesthetic  sense,  his  sense  for 
beauty,  the  vital  principle  in  Music,  is,  after  all, 
emotional  expression. 

Still,  the  absolute  autocracy  of  emotional  ex- 
pressiveness in  Music  has  never  lasted  very  long. 
As  soon  as  the  novelty  of  highly  expressive,  but 
organically  rudimentary,  musical  forms  wears  off, 
the  violent  appeal  they  make  to  Man's  emotional 
nature  ceases  to  compensate  him  for  their  intrinsic 
musical  poverty  ;  his  starving  aesthetic  sense  craves 
its  old  nourishment,  and  he  longs  for  music  that 
shall  be  not  only  expressive,  but  beautiful  also. 
To  be  sure,  a  return  to  the  old  highly  organized 


342  MUSIC  AND  SCIENCE 

forms  is  out  of  the  question  ;  for  they  are  no  long- 
er able  to  satisfy  the  demands  he  has  just  learnt  to 
make  upon  expression.  He  finds  them  beautiful 
as  ever,  perhaps,  but  cold,  formal,  and,  upon  the 
whole,  rather  dreary.  He  can  not  throw  his  whole 
heart  and  soul  into  them  as  he  used  to !  He  can 
still  listen  with  delight  to  what  the  old  masters 
wrote  in  these  forms,  but  write  in  them  himself  he 
can  not ;  life  has  gone  out  from  them,  and  all  he 
can  do  with  them  is  artificially  to  galvanize  them 
into  a  merely  conventional  semblance  of  life.  They 
are  dead  for  once  and  all! 

At  such  periods  we  are  pretty  sure  to  find  a  new 
era  of  evolution  set  in.  A  sort  of  intermarriage 
takes  place  between  the  discarded  forms,  with  their 
complex  organism,  and  the  new  rudimentary  ex- 
pressive ones  ;  and  the  offspring  of  this  union  will 
show  a  more  or  less  marked  resemblance  to  both 
parents.  The  new  evolution  has  begun,  and  will 
in  time  produce  forms  of  as  high,  or  even  higher 
and  more  complex,  organism  than  the  old  ones  of 
yore,  while  they  retain  much  of  the  emotionally 
expressive  power  of  their  simpler  ancestors.  With 
such  diastole-systole  of  Man's  craving  for  emotional 
expression  and  for  the  satisfaction  of  his  specific 
musical  sense,  as  its  prime  moving  and  conditioning 
forces,  has  the  evolution  of  the  Art  of  Music  gone 
forward. 


MUSIC  AND  SCIENCE  343 

This  evolution,  in  all  its  myriad  details,  is  what 
the  Science  of  Music  has  to  reveal  to  us  ;  it  has  to 
observe  and  classify  all  its  phenomena,  discover  all 
its  laws,  and  no  doubt  account  for  and  explain 
the  same  by  having  recourse  to  the  aid  of  other 
sciences,  such  as  Psychology,  Physiology,  Physics, 
and  Mathematics.  It  must  proceed  inductively 
throughout.  Such  a  Science  of  Music  will  be,  as 
I  have  said,  a  science  worthy  of  the  name  and  of 
our  present  century  of  scientific  progress. 

I  may  be  asked  why  I  say  Will  be  ?  why  I  use 
the  future  tense?  I  began  by  saying  Musical  Sci- 
ence was  young ;  I  might  almost  say  that  it  is 
hardly  born  yet.  No  doubt  the  world  has  had 
well-nigh  endless  treatises  on  Music  that  purported 
to  be  scientific  ;  many  an  earnest  and  hard-working 
musical  theorist  has  been  born  and  carried  to  his 
grave.  But  I  have  seen  no  theory  of  Harmony  yet, 
— to  take  up  only  this  one  point, — which  was  able 
to  account  for  and  explain  the  harmony  of  Sebas- 
tian Bach  !  A  vast  number  of  the  explanations 
currently  given  in  books  on  Harmony  are  really  no 
explanations  at  all ;  they  remind  one  of  that  ter- 
rible old  e '  Subjunctive  of  the  Indirect  Question  " 
that  was  once  the  bugbear  of  every  intelligent 
school-boy.  It  made  him  feel  in  his  heart  of  heart 
that  his  master's  armour  was  penetrable  ;  for  I 
fancy  none  of  us,  the  head-master  and  Andrews  & 


344  MUSIC   AND   SCIENCE 

Stoddard  to  the  contrary  notwithstanding,  ever 
could  be  really  persuaded  that  "  Dixi  quid  bonum 
sit "  was  an  indirect  question  !  Then  again,  the 
old  deductive  method  keeps  cropping  up  ever  and 
anon  ;  speculation,  guided  by  what  Schopenhauer 
once  called  "  a  misleading  desire  for  architectural 
symmetry  of  plan,"  too  often  tries  to  do  the  work 
of  logical  reasoning  from  accurately  observed  pre- 
mises. Sweeping  and  irrational  generalizations 
neatly  tie  up  irreconcilable  things  in  one  and  the 
same  bundle  ;  at  times  it  seems  as  if  the  very  last 
thing  to  occur  to  a  theorist,  anxious  to  explain 
why  this  or  that  is  so,  was  to  try  and  find  out  how 
it  became  so  ! 

One  of  the  most  serious  troubles  has  been  that 
musical  theorists  have  far  too  seldom  been  men  of 
scientific  training  ;  they  have  too  often  lacked  the 
very  first  requisite  for  scientific  research  :  a  well 
cultivated  power  of  observation.  Hence  their  pre- 
vailing tendency  to  "  evolve  the  camel  out  of  their 
own  brain."  And,  as  for  that  worst  vice  of  the 
deductive  method,  the  categorical  imperative,  they 
have  coquetted  with  that  to  a  sufficiently  scanda- 
lous extent.  No  wonder  that  acousticians — who, 
as  true  men  of  science,  ought,  however,  to  have 
known  better — have  taken  their  cue  from  them, 
and  treated  the  Art  of  Music  as  fair  game  for  their 
"  Thou  shalt "  and  "  Thou  shalt  not,"  and  made 


MUSIC   AND  SCIENCE  345 

themselves  a  bore  to  the  world  by  telling  musicians 
"  what  they  ought  to  do  ! " 

And,  worst  of  all,  musicians  have  not  always 
been  deaf  to  theorists  and  theories  against  which 
their  own  better  instinct  should  have  put  them  on 
their  guard.  Even  Hector  Berlioz — who  was  not 
in  general  particularly  docile  under  the  sway  of 
conventional  rules — once  took  upon  himself  to  find 
fault  with  "  the  third  inversion  of  the  chord  of 
the  dominant  9th  "  in  the  prelude  to  the  third  act 
of  Wagner's  Lohengrin,  saying  that  it  was  ' '  unen- 
durable to  his  ear."  Ah  !  Berlioz  ;  were  you  quite 
sure  that  that  E,  F-sharp,  A,  0,  D  really  was  the 
"  third  inversion  "  of  the  dominant  9th  ?  Or  was 
that  pompous  melody  in  the  basses,  trombones,  and 
tuba  not  really  a  bass,  after  all,  but  merely  a  me- 
lody, played  against  a  plain  harmonic  accompani- 
ment, like  any  other  melody,  only  below,  instead 
of  above  it  ?  It  seems  to  me,  Berlioz,  that  you, 
for  once,  let  your  eye — and  your  schooling — get 
the  better  of  your  ear  ;  you  did  not  feel  the  force 
of  the  unwritten  law  that  makes  your  objection 
ridiculous  ! 

But  it  is  none  the  less  to  the  shame  of  Musical 
Science  that  this,  or  any  other,  law  should  remain 
"  unwritten."  It  is  to  her  shame  that  she  has  not 
yet  formulated  and  explained  the  many  things  that 
almost  every  cultivated  musician  feels  in  his  very 


346  MUSIC   AND   SCIENCE 

bones,  and  knows  as  well  as  he  knows  that  fire 
burns,  but  can  not  formulate  nor  explain.  Neither 
is  it  his  business  to  formulate  and  explain  such 
things  ;  his  intuitive  knowledge  of  them  is  enough 
for  his  high  purposes.  It  is  for  the  Science  of 
Music,  for  the  musical  scientist, — not  for  the  musi- 
cal artist, — to  explain  them. 


FINIS 


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Period 

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no  connoisseur,  or  person  making  any  pretension  to  musical  taste,  should  be  with- 
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Letters  of  a  Baritone 

lGmo.      SI. 25 

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study  of  Italian,  the  cost  of  living  and  of  lessons,  the  theatres,  piano 
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THE  MUSIC  STORY  SERIES 

Edited  by  F.  J.  CKOWEST 

The  great  aim  of  this  Series  is  to  make  them  indispensable  vol- 
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interesting,  and  educational  books  —  furnished  with  appendices, 
which  will  give  them  permanent  value  as  works  of  reference,  data, 
etc.  Each  volume  tells  all  that  the  reader  may  want  to  know  upon 
any  of  the  aspects  of  musical  art  treated,  and  is  written  by  a  specialist. 

The  books  are  produced  in  the  highest  style  of  typographical  ex- 
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THE  STORY  OF  ENGLISH  MUSIC,  1604-1904.  Being  the  Lectures 
given  at  the  Music  Town  Exhibition.     London:  June— July,  1904. 

THE  STORY  OF  ORATORIO.  By  Annie  W.  Patterson.  With  a  Collo- 
type portrait  of  Handel,  four  half-tone  portraits  of  the  great  com- 
posers of  Oratorios,  numerous  line  reproductions  in  facsimile,  and 
a  splendid  Photogravure  Frontispiece  of  Raphael's  masterpiece 
— "St.  Cecilia" — after  the  painting  in  the  Academy  of  Bologna. 

THE  STORY  OF  NOTATION.     By  C.  F.  Abdy  Williams,  H.A.,  Mas.  Bac. 

Illustrated. 

"This  is  a  volume  of  sound  and  lasting  value." — The  New  York  Tribune. 

THE  STORY  OF  THE  ORGAN.    By  G.  F.  Abdy  Williams,  H.A.,  Mus.  Bac. 

With  many  illustrations. 

"It  should  be  in  the  library  of  every  organist  or  lover  of  the  organ." 

—The  Interior. 

THE  STORY  OF  CHAMBER  MUSIC.     By  N.  KUbnra.     With  numerous 

illustrations  and  examples. 

"He  has  many  critical  and  analytical  notes  of  chamber  composition  illustrated 
by  examples  in  notes,  and  his  attention  to  the  new  Russian  school  in  this  respect 
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THE  STORY  OF  THE  VIOLIN.  By  Paul  Stoevin^.  Professor  of  the 
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illustrations  and  examples. 

"A  true  and  reliable  vade  mecum  for  violinists.  The  book  may  be  unhesitat- 
ingly recommended  to  professional  and  dilettante." — The  Churchman. 

THE  STORY  OF  THE  HARP.  By  W.  H.  Grattan  Flood,  organist  of 
Enniscorthy  Cathedral.  With  numerous  illustrations.  A  volume 
which  admirably  answers  the  need  of  a  popular  manual,  illustra- 
ting the  development  and  power  of  this  unique  instrument. 

THE  STORY  OF  ORGAN  MUSIC.  By  C.  F.  Abdy  Williams.  Illustrated. 
A  full  and  detailed  account  of  the  best  compositions  for  the  organ 
from  the  earliest  times. 


THE  MUSIC  STORY  SERIES 

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THE  STORY  OF  THE  PIANOFORTE.  By  Algernon  S.  Rose,  author  of 
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By  F.  L.  RITTER 

Music  in  America 

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the  book  is  the  catholic  tone  that  pervades  it." — Boston  Transcript. 

By  W.  H.  FROST 

The  Wagner  Story  Book 

Fire-Light  Tales  of  the  Great  Music-Dramas 

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serve  new  purposes.  ...  In  a  way  that  is  as  luminous  as  it  is  graceful  and  tender 
he  has  enforced  the  lessons  of  truthfulness,  beauty  and  goodness." 

—New  York  Tribune. 


By  HANNAH  SMITH 

Music: 

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ment of  musical  art  that  it  has  been  our  fortune  ever  to  meet" 

— The  Independent. 

By  ARTHUR  MEES 

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—The  Nation. 

THE  FIELD-DE  KOVEN  SONG  BOOK 
Songs  of  Childhood 

VERSES    BY   EUGENE    FIELD 
MUSIC  BY  REGINALD  DE  KOVEN  AND  OTHERS 

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THE  STEVENSON  SONG  BOOK 

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WORDS  BY  ROBERT  LOUIS  STEVENSON 
MUSIC    BY    VARIOUS    COMPOSERS 

Small  Quarto.      Boards,  81.00 

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Book"  has  created  a  demand  for  a  volume  of  Stevenson's  lyrics  which  should  be 
treated  in  the  same  manner.  The  twenty  songs  in  the  book  were  selected  for  the 
predominance  in  them  of  the  lyric  quality.  The  musical  settings  given  to  them 
are  melodious,  simple,  and  well  marked  in  rhythm,  and  the  music  is  in  perfect  har- 
mony with  the  spirit  and  form  of  the  poems.  The  publishers  have  secured  the  co- 
operation of  a  number  of  the  most  eminent  of  American  and  English  song  writers. 


By  W.  F.  APTHORP 

The  Opera,  Past  and  Present 

The  Music  Dover's  Library.     With  Portraits.       12  mo.      81.25  net 

A  comprehensive  account  from  the  beginning  to  the  present  day. 

"  I  know  of  nothing  in  English,  or  for  that  matter  in  French  or  German,  that 
approaches  it  as  a  manual  for  the  student,  and  as  a  delight  for  the  average 
reader." — Philip  Hale  in  the  Boston  Journal. 

"It  is  a  capitally  good  treatise,  written  with  such  clarity  that  any  intelligent 
lover  of  music  can  comprehend  it,  demonstrating  with  cogent  force  the  philosophy 
of  the  evolution  of  this  great  branch  of  musical  science  and  art,  rich  in  wise  and 
illuminating  criticism." — Henry  Austin  Clapp  in  the  Boston  Advertiser. 

Musicians  and  Music-Lovers 

And  Other  Essays 

liimo.      81.50 

"The  essay  on  Bach  is  an  admirable  appreciation,  without  any  of  the  rhapsody 
into  which  admiring  criticism  is  so  apt  to  run.  Those  on  '  Two  Modern  Classi- 
cists'  and  'John  Sullivan  Dwight'  are  in  the  nature  of  portraiture,  and  are  so  skil- 
fully done  as  to  give  intelligible  and  individual  impressions.  And  throughout  the 
book,  indeed,  there  are  evident  a  justness,  a  moderation,  an  absence  of  partisan- 
ship and  a  sincere  anxiety  to  be  right  that  make  the  volume  valuable  as  well  as 
interesting. " — New  York  Times. 

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cIhe  Cyclopedia  of  Music^  Musicians 

Edited  by  JOHN  P.  CHAMPLAIN,  JR. 

Critical  Editor,  WIIXIAM  F.  APTHORP 

With  more  than  1000  Illustrations.       3  vols.       8vo.       815.00  net 

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